Data-aided beam management

ABSTRACT

Methods, systems, and devices for wireless communications are described. Beam management procedures may increase communications quality and reliability in wireless networks that support narrow directional beams and high frequencies. Some such beam management procedures utilize continuous beam measurements and adaptive beam switching to maintain a threshold link level between devices. A user equipment (UE) may transmit an indication of a capability to perform a first beam refinement procedure in response to a data transmission and using multiple receive beams. The UE may select a communication beam using a first instance of a second beam refinement procedure, and may receive a data transmission from a base station using the selected beam. Based on receiving the data transmission, the UE may perform the first beam refinement procedure and may skip a second instance of the second beam refinement procedure.

TECHNICAL FIELD

The following relates to wireless communication, and specifically todata-aided beam management techniques.

DESCRIPTION OF THE RELATED TECHNOLOGY

Wireless communications systems are widely deployed to provide varioustypes of communication content such as voice, video, packet data,messaging, broadcast, and so on. These systems may be capable ofsupporting communication with multiple users by sharing the availablesystem resources (for example, time, frequency, and power). Examples ofsuch multiple-access systems include fourth generation (4G) systems suchas Long Term Evolution (LTE) systems, LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) systems, orLTE-A Pro systems, and fifth generation (5G) systems which may bereferred to as New Radio (NR) systems. These systems may employtechnologies such as code division multiple access (CDMA), time divisionmultiple access (TDMA), frequency division multiple access (FDMA),orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA), or discreteFourier transform spread orthogonal frequency division multiplexing(DFT-S-OFDM). A wireless multiple-access communications system mayinclude one or more base stations or one or more network access nodes,each simultaneously supporting communication for multiple communicationdevices, which may be otherwise known as user equipment (UE).

A UE may implement various beam selection and beam refinement techniquesto establish and maintain communications in a wireless communicationsnetwork. Performing some beam refinement techniques multiple times,however, may involve relatively long durations for performance,relatively infrequent beam management periodicity compared to beamcondition changes, relatively high overhead because some symbolsdesignated for beam refinement may not be able to contain data, or anycombination thereof. Enhanced beam management techniques for achievinghigher reliability and throughput for such communications are desired.

SUMMARY

The described techniques relate to improved methods, systems, devices,and apparatuses that support data-aided beam management. Generally, thedescribed techniques provide for enhanced beam management procedures tosupport increased communications quality and reliability in wirelessnetworks that may use, for example, relatively narrow directional beamsand relatively high frequencies. Some beam management procedures, insome cases, may utilize beam measurements (for example, reference signalreceive power (RSRP) measurements, signal-to-interference-plus-noiseratio (SINR) measurements, channel quality indications (CQI), amongother examples) along with adaptive beam switching to maintain athreshold link level between a user equipment (UE) and a base station.

In some cases, devices may implement a multi-step P1-P2-P3 beammanagement procedure for beam selection and refinement. During the P1and P2 procedures, the base station may transmit and sweep one or moretransmit beams, and may refine the one or more transmit beams (e.g.,from relatively wide beams to relatively narrow beams) to select atransmit beam for establishing a connection with the UE. During the P3procedure, the UE may perform receive beam refinement by receivingtransmissions from the selected transmit beam of the base station duringconsecutive symbols (for example, repeated transmissions by the selectedtransmit beam) to determine one or more best receive beams to be used bythe UE.

In some examples of the present disclosure, the UE may have a capabilityto concurrently or simultaneously receive a transmission from the basestation using multiple receive beams (for example, the UE may receiveoverlapping transmissions from the base station on multiple receivebeams, or may receive multiple transmissions on different receive beamsat the same time), which may reduce the time for conducting beamselection and refinement. Based on the capability to conduct beamrefinement on multiple receive beams concurrently or simultaneously, theUE may be configured to skip performing one or more later instances of abeam refinement procedure, such as skipping a second instance of the P3beam refinement procedure, based on one or more conditions. As oneexample of the one or more conditions, the base station may transmitdata to the UE, and the UE may receive the data using one or morereceive beams. Based on performing measurements on at least some if noteach receive beam in accordance with the UE capability, the UE may skipa later beam refinement procedure, such as the later P3 beam refinementprocedure, among other advantages.

One innovative aspect of the subject matter described in this disclosurecan be implemented in a method for wireless communication at a UE. Themethod includes The method may include transmitting, to a base station,an indication of a capability of the UE to perform a first beamrefinement procedure in response to a data transmission and using a setof receive beams, selecting a first receive beam from the set of receivebeams based on performing a first instance of a second beam refinementprocedure using the set of receive beams, receiving the datatransmission from the base station using the set of receive beamsincluding the first receive beam before a second instance of the secondbeam refinement procedure, and performing the first beam refinementprocedure based on receiving the data transmission.

Another innovative aspect of the subject matter described in thisdisclosure can be implemented in an apparatus for wireless communicationat a UE. The apparatus may include a processor, memory coupled with theprocessor, and instructions stored in the memory. The instructions maybe executable by the processor to cause the apparatus to transmit, to abase station, an indication of a capability of the UE to perform a firstbeam refinement procedure in response to a data transmission and using aset of receive beams, select a first receive beam from the set ofreceive beams based on performing a first instance of a second beamrefinement procedure using the set of receive beams, receive the datatransmission from the base station using the set of receive beamsincluding the first receive beam before a second instance of the secondbeam refinement procedure, and perform the first beam refinementprocedure based on receiving the data transmission.

Another innovative aspect of the subject matter described in thisdisclosure can be implemented in another apparatus for wirelesscommunication at a UE. The apparatus may include means for transmitting,to a base station, an indication of a capability of the UE to perform afirst beam refinement procedure in response to a data transmission andusing a set of receive beams, selecting a first receive beam from theset of receive beams based on performing a first instance of a secondbeam refinement procedure using the set of receive beams, receiving thedata transmission from the base station using the set of receive beamsincluding the first receive beam before a second instance of the secondbeam refinement procedure, and performing the first beam refinementprocedure based on receiving the data transmission.

Another innovative aspect of the subject matter described in thisdisclosure can be implemented in an non-transitory computer readablemedium for storing code at a UE. The code may include instructionsexecutable by a processor to transmit, to a base station, an indicationof a capability of the UE to perform a first beam refinement procedurein response to a data transmission and using a set of receive beams,select a first receive beam from the set of receive beams based onperforming a first instance of a second beam refinement procedure usingthe set of receive beams, receive the data transmission from the basestation using the set of receive beams including the first receive beambefore a second instance of the second beam refinement procedure, andperform the first beam refinement procedure based on receiving the datatransmission.

Another innovative aspect of the subject matter described in thisdisclosure can be implemented in a method for wireless communication ata base station. The method may include receiving, from a UE, anindication of a capability of the UE to perform a first beam refinementprocedure in response to a data transmission and using a set of receivebeams, transmitting a same transmit beam over consecutive symbols to theUE as part of a first instance of a second beam refinement procedure,and transmitting the data transmission to the UE before a secondinstance of the second beam refinement procedure based on receiving theindication of the capability of the UE and transmitting the sametransmit beam over consecutive symbols to the UE.

Another innovative aspect of the subject matter described in thisdisclosure can be implemented in an apparatus at a base station. Theapparatus may include a processor, memory coupled with the processor,and instructions stored in the memory. The instructions may beexecutable by the processor to cause the apparatus to receive, from aUE, an indication of a capability of the UE to perform a first beamrefinement procedure in response to a data transmission and using a setof receive beams, transmit a same transmit beam over consecutive symbolsto the UE as part of a first instance of a second beam refinementprocedure, and transmit the data transmission to the UE before a secondinstance of the second beam refinement procedure based on receiving theindication of the capability of the UE and transmitting the sametransmit beam over consecutive symbols to the UE.

Another innovative aspect of the subject matter described in thisdisclosure can be implemented in another apparatus at a base station.The apparatus may include means for receiving, from a UE, an indicationof a capability of the UE to perform a first beam refinement procedurein response to a data transmission and using a set of receive beams,transmitting a same transmit beam over consecutive symbols to the UE aspart of a first instance of a second beam refinement procedure, andtransmitting the data transmission to the UE before a second instance ofthe second beam refinement procedure based on receiving the indicationof the capability of the UE and transmitting the same transmit beam overconsecutive symbols to the UE.

Another innovative aspect of the subject matter described in thisdisclosure can be implemented in an non-transitory computer readablemedium for storing code at a base station. The code may includeinstructions executable by a processor to receive, from a UE, anindication of a capability of the UE to perform a first beam refinementprocedure in response to a data transmission and using a set of receivebeams, transmit a same transmit beam over consecutive symbols to the UEas part of a first instance of a second beam refinement procedure, andtransmit the data transmission to the UE before a second instance of thesecond beam refinement procedure based on receiving the indication ofthe capability of the UE and transmitting the same transmit beam overconsecutive symbols to the UE.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 illustrates an example of a wireless communications system thatsupports data-aided beam management in accordance with aspects of thepresent disclosure.

FIG. 2 illustrates an example of a wireless communications system thatsupports data-aided beam management in accordance with aspects of thepresent disclosure.

FIG. 3 illustrates an example of a communications timeline that supportsdata-aided beam management in accordance with aspects of the presentdisclosure.

FIG. 4 illustrates an example of a process flow that supports data-aidedbeam management in accordance with aspects of the present disclosure.

FIGS. 5 and 6 show block diagrams of devices that support data-aidedbeam management in accordance with aspects of the present disclosure.

FIG. 7 shows a block diagram of a communications manager that supportsdata-aided beam management in accordance with aspects of the presentdisclosure.

FIG. 8 shows a diagram of a system including a device that supportsdata-aided beam management in accordance with aspects of the presentdisclosure.

FIGS. 9 and 10 show block diagrams of devices that support data-aidedbeam management in accordance with aspects of the present disclosure.

FIG. 11 shows a block diagram of a communications manager that supportsdata-aided beam management in accordance with aspects of the presentdisclosure.

FIG. 12 shows a diagram of a system including a device that supportsdata-aided beam management in accordance with aspects of the presentdisclosure.

FIGS. 13 through 17 show flowcharts illustrating methods that supportdata-aided beam management in accordance with aspects of the presentdisclosure.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Some beam management procedures may utilize a number of beammeasurements (for example, reference signal receive power (RSRP)measurements, signal to interference plus noise ratio (SINR)measurements, or channel quality indications (CQI), among otherexamples) along with adaptive beam switching to maintain a thresholdlink level between devices, such as a base station and a user equipment(UE). In some cases, the devices may implement a multi-step P1-P2-P3beam management procedure for beam selection and refinement. During theP1 and P2 procedures, the base station may transmit and sweep one ormore transmit beams, and refine the one or more transmit beams to selectone of the one or more transmit beams and for establishing a connectionwith the UE. During the P3 procedure, the UE may perform receive beamrefinement by receiving transmissions from a same transmit beam of thebase station during consecutive symbols (for example, repeatedtransmissions by the selected transmit beam) to determine one or morebetter or best receive beams to be used by the UE. During the P3 beamrefinement procedure, the UE may measure each of the signals receivedfrom the selected transmission beam on each of the receive beams, andmay determine the one or more better or best receive beams based on themeasurements.

Various aspects generally relate to data-aided beam management, and morespecifically to conducting beam refinement based on receiving a datatransmission and in accordance with a UE capability. In some cases, P3beam refinement (in which each receive beam is measured separately in aserial manner) may result in relatively large beam-sweeping overhead andsignaling latency. In some examples of the present disclosure, however,the UE may have the capability to concurrently or simultaneously receivea transmission from the base station using each receive beam (or asubset of the UE receive beams), which may reduce the time forconducting beam selection and refinement and avoid the disadvantages ofthe P3 beam refinement.

Based on the capability of the UE to conduct beam refinement on multiplereceive beams concurrently or simultaneously, the UE may be furtherconfigured to skip (for example, refrain from performing) one or morelater instances of another beam refinement procedure (for example, asecond instance of the P3 beam refinement procedure) after the initialmulti-step P1-P2-P3 procedure may be performed. In some examples, the UEmay establish a communication link with the base station (by performingthe multi-step P1-P2-P3 procedure) and may transit a capabilityindication to the base station (for example, an indication of thecapability to concurrently or simultaneously receive a data transmissionfrom the base station using multiple receive beams). The base stationmay transmit data to the UE, for example, after performance of themulti-step P1-P2-P3 procedure, in a physical downlink shared channel(PDSCH) based on receiving the capability indication. Based on receivingthe data, the UE may perform beam refinement before a time scheduled fora later instance of the P3 beam refinement procedure and may skip thelater instance of the P3 beam refinement procedure. In some otherexamples, the UE may perform beam refinement based on receiving ademodulation reference signal (DMRS) pilot sequence, a control channeltransmission such as a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH)transmission, data, or any combination thereof.

Various procedures for beam selection and beam refinement describedherein may increase communications quality and reliability for networksthat support relatively large numbers of relatively narrow beams andrelatively high frequencies. Particular aspects of the subject matterdescribed in this disclosure may be implemented to realize one or moreof the following potential advantages. In some examples, the operationsperformed by the described communication devices may provideimprovements to beam refinement by performing, for example, continuouslyperforming, beam measurements on multiple receive beams of a device (forexample, instead of performing beam refinement according to a specifiedperiodicity such as using a P3 procedure). For example, a device may beable to efficiently react to system changes or beam degradation byperforming beam refinement earlier based on receiving a datatransmission, which may reduce the latency associated with conducting abeam management procedure. In some implementations, the operationsperformed by the described communication devices may reduce or eliminatelater instances of P3 beam refinement, which may also reduce the timeused to perform beam management, increase power savings for devices inthe network, and allow for alternative use of the time that wouldotherwise be used for performing one or more later instances of P3 beamrefinement. Such alternative use of the time allocated for later P3 beamrefinement may additionally save overhead, which may also increasesystem throughput. In some implementations, operations performed by thedescribed communication devices may also support reduced signalingoverhead, improvements to beam management tracking, increasedreliability for beamformed communications, higher data rates andthroughput and, in some examples, more dynamic beam switching, amongother benefits.

Aspects of the disclosure are initially described in the context ofwireless communications systems. Aspects of the disclosure are furtherillustrated by and described with reference to apparatus diagrams,system diagrams, a communications timeline, a process flow, andadditional flowcharts that relate to data-aided beam management.

FIG. 1 illustrates an example of a wireless communications system 100that supports data-aided beam management in accordance with aspects ofthe present disclosure. The wireless communications system 100 mayinclude one or more base stations 105, one or more UEs 115, and a corenetwork 130. In some examples, the wireless communications system 100may be a Long Term Evolution (LTE) network, an LTE-Advanced (LTE-A)network, an LTE-A Pro network, or a New Radio (NR) network. In someexamples, the wireless communications system 100 may support enhancedbroadband communications, ultra-reliable (for example, mission critical)communications, low latency communications, communications with low-costand low-complexity devices, or any combination thereof.

The base stations 105 may be dispersed throughout a geographic area toform the wireless communications system 100 and may be devices indifferent forms or having different capabilities. The base stations 105and the UEs 115 may wirelessly communicate via one or more communicationlinks 125. Each base station 105 may provide a coverage area 110 overwhich the UEs 115 and the base station 105 may establish one or morecommunication links 125. The coverage area 110 may be an example of ageographic area over which a base station 105 and a UE 115 may supportthe communication of signals according to one or more radio accesstechnologies.

The UEs 115 may be dispersed throughout a coverage area 110 of thewireless communications system 100, and each UE 115 may be stationary,or mobile, or both at different times. The UEs 115 may be devices indifferent forms or having different capabilities. Some example UEs 115are illustrated in FIG. 1. The UEs 115 described herein may be able tocommunicate with various types of devices, such as other UEs 115, thebase stations 105, or network equipment (for example, core networknodes, relay devices, integrated access and backhaul (IAB) nodes, orother network equipment), as shown in FIG. 1.

The base stations 105 may communicate with the core network 130, or withone another, or both. For example, the base stations 105 may interfacewith the core network 130 through one or more backhaul links 120 (forexample, via an S1, N2, N3, or other interface). The base stations 105may communicate with one another over the backhaul links 120 (forexample, via an X2, Xn, or other interface) either directly (forexample, directly between base stations 105), or indirectly (forexample, via core network 130), or both. In some examples, the backhaullinks 120 may be or include one or more wireless links.

One or more of the base stations 105 described herein may include or maybe referred to by a person having ordinary skill in the art as a basetransceiver station, a radio base station, an access point, a radiotransceiver, a NodeB, an eNodeB (eNB), a next-generation NodeB or agiga-NodeB (either of which may be referred to as a gNB), a Home NodeB,a Home eNodeB, or other suitable terminology.

A UE 115 may include or may be referred to as a mobile device, awireless device, a remote device, a handheld device, or a subscriberdevice, or some other suitable terminology, where the “device” may alsobe referred to as a unit, a station, a terminal, or a client, amongother examples. A UE 115 may also include or may be referred to as apersonal electronic device such as a cellular phone, a personal digitalassistant (PDA), a tablet computer, a laptop computer, or a personalcomputer. In some examples, a UE 115 may include or be referred to as awireless local loop (WLL) station, an Internet of Things (IoT) device,an Internet of Everything (IoE) device, or a machine type communications(MTC) device, among other examples, which may be implemented in variousobjects such as appliances, or vehicles, meters, among other examples.

The UEs 115 described herein may be able to communicate with varioustypes of devices, such as other UEs 115 that may sometimes act as relaysas well as the base stations 105 and the network equipment includingmacro eNBs or gNBs, small cell eNBs or gNBs, or relay base stations,among other examples, as shown in FIG. 1.

The UEs 115 and the base stations 105 may wirelessly communicate withone another via one or more communication links 125 over one or morecarriers. The term “carrier” may refer to a set of radio frequencyspectrum resources having a defined physical layer structure forsupporting the communication links 125. For example, a carrier used fora communication link 125 may include a portion of a radio frequencyspectrum band (for example, a bandwidth part (BWP)) that is operatedaccording to one or more physical layer channels for a given radioaccess technology (for example, LTE, LTE-A, LTE-A Pro, NR). Eachphysical layer channel may carry acquisition signaling (for example,synchronization signals, system information), control signaling thatcoordinates operation for the carrier, user data, or other signaling.The wireless communications system 100 may support communication with aUE 115 using carrier aggregation or multi-carrier operation. A UE 115may be configured with multiple downlink component carriers and one ormore uplink component carriers according to a carrier aggregationconfiguration. Carrier aggregation may be used with both frequencydivision duplexing (FDD) and time division duplexing (TDD) componentcarriers.

In some examples (for example, in a carrier aggregation configuration),a carrier may also have acquisition signaling or control signaling thatcoordinates operations for other carriers. A carrier may be associatedwith a frequency channel (for example, an evolved universal mobiletelecommunication system terrestrial radio access (E-UTRA) absoluteradio frequency channel number (EARFCN)) and may be positioned accordingto a channel raster for discovery by the UEs 115. A carrier may beoperated in a standalone mode where initial acquisition and connectionmay be conducted by the UEs 115 via the carrier, or the carrier may beoperated in a non-standalone mode where a connection is anchored using adifferent carrier (for example, of the same or a different radio accesstechnology).

The communication links 125 shown in the wireless communications system100 may include uplink transmissions from a UE 115 to a base station105, or downlink transmissions from a base station 105 to a UE 115.Carriers may carry downlink or uplink communications (for example, in anFDD mode) or may be configured to carry downlink and uplinkcommunications (for example, in a TDD mode).

A carrier may be associated with a particular bandwidth of the radiofrequency spectrum, and in some examples the carrier bandwidth may bereferred to as a “system bandwidth” of the carrier or the wirelesscommunications system 100. For example, the carrier bandwidth may be oneof a number of determined bandwidths for carriers of a particular radioaccess technology (for example, 1.4, 3, 5, 10, 15, 20, 40, or 80megahertz (MHz)). Devices of the wireless communications system 100 (forexample, the base stations 105, the UEs 115, or both) may have hardwareconfigurations that support communications over a particular carrierbandwidth or may be configurable to support communications over one of aset of carrier bandwidths. In some examples, the wireless communicationssystem 100 may include base stations 105 or UEs 115 that supportsimultaneous communications via carriers associated with multiplecarrier bandwidths. In some examples, each served UE 115 may beconfigured for operating over portions (for example, a sub-band, a BWP)or all of a carrier bandwidth.

Signal waveforms transmitted over a carrier may be made up of multiplesubcarriers (for example, using multi-carrier modulation (MCM)techniques such as orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) ordiscrete Fourier transform spread OFDM (DFT-S-OFDM)). In a systememploying MCM techniques, a resource element may consist of one symbolperiod (for example, a duration of one modulation symbol) and onesubcarrier, where the symbol period and subcarrier spacing are inverselyrelated. The number of bits carried by each resource element may dependon the modulation scheme (for example, the order of the modulationscheme, the coding rate of the modulation scheme, or both). Thus, themore resource elements that a UE 115 receives and the higher the orderof the modulation scheme, the higher the data rate may be for the UE115. A wireless communications resource may refer to a combination of aradio frequency spectrum resource, a time resource, and a spatialresource (for example, spatial layers or beams), and the use of multiplespatial layers may further increase the data rate or data integrity forcommunications with a UE 115.

One or more numerologies for a carrier may be supported, where anumerology may include a subcarrier spacing (Δf) and a cyclic prefix. Acarrier may be divided into one or more BWPs having the same ordifferent numerologies. In some examples, a UE 115 may be configuredwith multiple BWPs. In some examples, a single BWP for a carrier may beactive at a given time and communications for the UE 115 may berestricted to one or more active BWPs.

The time intervals for the base stations 105 or the UEs 115 may beexpressed in multiples of a basic time unit which may, for example,refer to a sampling period of T_(s)=1/(Δf_(max)·N_(f)) seconds, whereΔf_(max) may represent the maximum supported subcarrier spacing, andN_(f) may represent the maximum supported discrete Fourier transform(DFT) size. Time intervals of a communications resource may be organizedaccording to radio frames each having a specified duration (for example,10 milliseconds (ms)). Each radio frame may be identified by a systemframe number (SFN) (for example, ranging from 0 to 1023).

Each frame may include multiple consecutively numbered subframes orslots, and each subframe or slot may have the same duration. In someexamples, a frame may be divided (for example, in the time domain) intosubframes, and each subframe may be further divided into a number ofslots. Alternatively, each frame may include a variable number of slots,and the number of slots may depend on subcarrier spacing. Each slot mayinclude a number of symbol periods (for example, depending on the lengthof the cyclic prefix prepended to each symbol period). In some wirelesscommunications systems 100, a slot may further be divided into multiplemini-slots containing one or more symbols. Excluding the cyclic prefix,each symbol period may contain one or more (for example, N_(f)) samplingperiods. The duration of a symbol period may depend on the subcarrierspacing or frequency band of operation.

A subframe, a slot, a mini-slot, or a symbol may be the smallestscheduling unit (for example, in the time domain) of the wirelesscommunications system 100 and may be referred to as a transmission timeinterval (TTI). In some examples, the TTI duration (for example, thenumber of symbol periods in a TTI) may be variable. Additionally oralternatively, the smallest scheduling unit of the wirelesscommunications system 100 may be dynamically selected (for example, inbursts of shortened TTIs (sTTIs)).

Physical channels may be multiplexed on a carrier according to varioustechniques. A physical control channel and a physical data channel maybe multiplexed on a downlink carrier, for example, using one or more oftime division multiplexing (TDM) techniques, frequency divisionmultiplexing (FDM) techniques, or hybrid TDM-FDM techniques. A controlregion (for example, a control resource set (CORESET)) for a physicalcontrol channel may be defined by a number of symbol periods and mayextend across the system bandwidth or a subset of the system bandwidthof the carrier. One or more control regions (for example, CORESETs) maybe configured for a set of the UEs 115. For example, one or more of theUEs 115 may monitor or search control regions for control informationaccording to one or more search space sets, and each search space setmay include one or multiple control channel candidates in one or moreaggregation levels arranged in a cascaded manner. An aggregation levelfor a control channel candidate may refer to a number of control channelresources (for example, control channel elements (CCEs)) associated withencoded information for a control information format having a givenpayload size. Search space sets may include common search space setsconfigured for sending control information to multiple UEs 115 andUE-specific search space sets for sending control information to aspecific UE 115.

Each base station 105 may provide communication coverage via one or morecells, for example a macro cell, a small cell, a hot spot, or othertypes of cells, or any combination thereof. The term “cell” may refer toa logical communication entity used for communication with a basestation 105 (for example, over a carrier) and may be associated with anidentifier for distinguishing neighboring cells (for example, a physicalcell identifier (PCID), a virtual cell identifier (VCID), or others). Insome examples, a cell may also refer to a geographic coverage area 110or a portion of a geographic coverage area 110 (for example, a sector)over which the logical communication entity operates. Such cells mayrange from smaller areas (for example, a structure, a subset ofstructure) to larger areas depending on various factors such as thecapabilities of the base station 105. For example, a cell may be orinclude a building, a subset of a building, or exterior spaces betweenor overlapping with geographic coverage areas 110, among other examples.

A macro cell generally covers a relatively large geographic area (forexample, several kilometers in radius) and may allow unrestricted accessby the UEs 115 with service subscriptions with the network providersupporting the macro cell. A small cell may be associated with alower-powered base station 105, as compared with a macro cell, and asmall cell may operate in the same or different (for example, licensed,unlicensed) frequency bands as macro cells. Small cells may provideunrestricted access to the UEs 115 with service subscriptions with thenetwork provider or may provide restricted access to the UEs 115 havingan association with the small cell (for example, the UEs 115 in a closedsubscriber group (CSG), the UEs 115 associated with users in a home oroffice). A base station 105 may support one or multiple cells and mayalso support communications over the one or more cells using one ormultiple component carriers.

In some examples, a carrier may support multiple cells, and differentcells may be configured according to different protocol types (forexample, MTC, narrowband IoT (NB-IoT), enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB))that may provide access for different types of devices.

In some examples, a base station 105 may be movable and thereforeprovide communication coverage for a moving geographic coverage area110. In some examples, different geographic coverage areas 110associated with different technologies may overlap, but the differentgeographic coverage areas 110 may be supported by the same base station105. In other examples, the overlapping geographic coverage areas 110associated with different technologies may be supported by differentbase stations 105. The wireless communications system 100 may include,for example, a heterogeneous network in which different types of thebase stations 105 provide coverage for various geographic coverage areas110 using the same or different radio access technologies.

The wireless communications system 100 may support synchronous orasynchronous operation. For synchronous operation, the base stations 105may have similar frame timings, and transmissions from different basestations 105 may be approximately aligned in time. For asynchronousoperation, the base stations 105 may have different frame timings, andtransmissions from different base stations 105 may, in some examples,not be aligned in time. The techniques described herein may be used foreither synchronous or asynchronous operations.

Some UEs 115, such as MTC or IoT devices, may be low cost or lowcomplexity devices and may provide for automated communication betweenmachines (for example, via Machine-to-Machine (M2M) communication). M2Mcommunication or MTC may refer to data communication technologies thatallow devices to communicate with one another or a base station 105without human intervention. In some examples, M2M communication or MTCmay include communications from devices that integrate sensors or metersto measure or capture information and relay such information to acentral server or application program that makes use of the informationor presents the information to humans interacting with the applicationprogram. Some UEs 115 may be designed to collect information or enableautomated behavior of machines or other devices. Examples ofapplications for MTC devices include smart metering, inventorymonitoring, water level monitoring, equipment monitoring, healthcaremonitoring, wildlife monitoring, weather and geological eventmonitoring, fleet management and tracking, remote security sensing,physical access control, and transaction-based business charging.

Some UEs 115 may be configured to employ operating modes that reducepower consumption, such as half-duplex communications (for example, amode that supports one-way communication via transmission or reception,but not transmission and reception simultaneously). In some examples,half-duplex communications may be performed at a reduced peak rate.Other power conservation techniques for the UEs 115 include entering apower saving deep sleep mode when not engaging in active communications,operating over a limited bandwidth (for example, according to narrowbandcommunications), or a combination of these techniques. For example, someUEs 115 may be configured for operation using a narrowband protocol typethat is associated with a defined portion or range (for example, set ofsubcarriers or resource blocks (RBs)) within a carrier, within aguard-band of a carrier, or outside of a carrier.

The wireless communications system 100 may be configured to supportultra-reliable communications or low-latency communications, or variouscombinations thereof. For example, the wireless communications system100 may be configured to support ultra-reliable low-latencycommunications (URLLC) or mission critical communications. The UEs 115may be designed to support ultra-reliable, low-latency, or criticalfunctions (for example, mission critical functions). Ultra-reliablecommunications may include private communication or group communicationand may be supported by one or more mission critical services such asmission critical push-to-talk (MCPTT), mission critical video (MCVideo),or mission critical data (MCData). Support for mission criticalfunctions may include prioritization of services, and mission criticalservices may be used for public safety or general commercialapplications. The terms ultra-reliable, low-latency, mission critical,and ultra-reliable low-latency may be used interchangeably herein.

In some examples, a UE 115 may also be able to communicate directly withother UEs 115 over a device-to-device (D2D) communication link 135 (forexample, using a peer-to-peer (P2P) or D2D protocol). One or more UEs115 utilizing D2D communications may be within the geographic coveragearea 110 of a base station 105. Other UEs 115 in such a group may beoutside the geographic coverage area 110 of a base station 105 or beotherwise unable to receive transmissions from a base station 105. Insome examples, groups of the UEs 115 communicating via D2Dcommunications may utilize a one-to-many (1:M) system in which each UE115 transmits to every other UE 115 in the group. In some examples, abase station 105 facilitates the scheduling of resources for D2Dcommunications. In other cases, D2D communications are carried outbetween the UEs 115 without the involvement of a base station 105.

In some systems, the D2D communication link 135 may be an example of acommunication channel, such as a sidelink communication channel, betweenvehicles (for example, UEs 115). In some examples, vehicles maycommunicate using vehicle-to-everything (V2X) communications,vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communications, or some combination of these. Avehicle may signal information related to traffic conditions, signalscheduling, weather, safety, emergencies, or any other informationrelevant to a V2X system. In some examples, vehicles in a V2X system maycommunicate with roadside infrastructure, such as roadside units, orwith the network via one or more network nodes (for example, basestations 105) using vehicle-to-network (V2N) communications, or withboth.

The core network 130 may provide user authentication, accessauthorization, tracking, Internet Protocol (IP) connectivity, and otheraccess, routing, or mobility functions. The core network 130 may be anevolved packet core (EPC) or 5G core (5GC), which may include at leastone control plane entity that manages access and mobility (for example,a mobility management entity (MME), an access and mobility managementfunction (AMF)) and at least one user plane entity that routes packetsor interconnects to external networks (for example, a serving gateway(S-GW), a Packet Data Network (PDN) gateway (P-GW), or a user planefunction (UPF)). The control plane entity may manage non-access stratum(NAS) functions such as mobility, authentication, and bearer managementfor the UEs 115 served by the base stations 105 associated with the corenetwork 130. User IP packets may be transferred through the user planeentity, which may provide IP address allocation as well as otherfunctions. The user plane entity may be connected to IP services 150 forone or more network operators. The IP services 150 may include access tothe Internet, Intranet(s), an IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS), or aPacket-Switched Streaming Service.

Some of the network devices, such as a base station 105, may includesubcomponents such as an access network entity 140, which may be anexample of an access node controller (ANC). Each access network entity140 may communicate with the UEs 115 through one or more other accessnetwork transmission entities 145, which may be referred to as radioheads, smart radio heads, or transmission/reception points (TRPs). Eachaccess network transmission entity 145 may include one or more antennapanels. In some configurations, various functions of each access networkentity 140 or base station 105 may be distributed across various networkdevices (for example, radio heads and ANCs) or consolidated into asingle network device (for example, a base station 105).

The wireless communications system 100 may operate using one or morefrequency bands, typically in the range of 300 megahertz (MHz) to 300gigahertz (GHz). Generally, the region from 300 MHz to 3 GHz is known asthe ultra-high frequency (UHF) region or decimeter band because thewavelengths range from approximately one decimeter to one meter inlength. The UHF waves may be blocked or redirected by buildings andenvironmental features, but the waves may penetrate structuressufficiently for a macro cell to provide service to the UEs 115 locatedindoors. The transmission of UHF waves may be associated with smallerantennas and shorter ranges (for example, less than 100 kilometers)compared to transmission using the smaller frequencies and longer wavesof the high frequency (HF) or very high frequency (VHF) portion of thespectrum below 300 MHz.

The wireless communications system 100 may also operate in a super highfrequency (SHF) region using frequency bands from 3 GHz to 30 GHz, alsoknown as the centimeter band, or in an extremely high frequency (EHF)region of the spectrum (for example, from 30 GHz to 300 GHz), also knownas the millimeter band. In some examples, the wireless communicationssystem 100 may support millimeter wave (mmW) communications between theUEs 115 and the base stations 105, and EHF antennas of the respectivedevices may be smaller and more closely spaced than UHF antennas. Insome examples, this may facilitate use of antenna arrays within adevice. The propagation of EHF transmissions, however, may be subject toeven greater atmospheric attenuation and shorter range than SHF or UHFtransmissions. The techniques disclosed herein may be employed acrosstransmissions that use one or more different frequency regions, anddesignated use of bands across these frequency regions may differ bycountry or regulating body.

The wireless communications system 100 may utilize both licensed andunlicensed radio frequency spectrum bands. For example, the wirelesscommunications system 100 may employ License Assisted Access (LAA),LTE-Unlicensed (LTE-U) radio access technology, or NR technology in anunlicensed band such as the 5 GHz industrial, scientific, and medical(ISM) band. When operating in unlicensed radio frequency spectrum bands,devices such as the base stations 105 and the UEs 115 may employ carriersensing for collision detection and avoidance. In some examples,operations in unlicensed bands may be based on a carrier aggregationconfiguration in conjunction with component carriers operating in alicensed band (for example, LAA). Operations in unlicensed spectrum mayinclude downlink transmissions, uplink transmissions, P2P transmissions,or D2D transmissions, among other examples.

A base station 105 or a UE 115 may be equipped with multiple antennas,which may be used to employ techniques such as transmit diversity,receive diversity, multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) communications,or beamforming. The antennas of a base station 105 or a UE 115 may belocated within one or more antenna arrays or antenna panels, which maysupport MIMO operations or transmit or receive beamforming. For example,one or more base station antennas or antenna arrays may be co-located atan antenna assembly, such as an antenna tower. In some examples,antennas or antenna arrays associated with a base station 105 may belocated in diverse geographic locations. A base station 105 may have anantenna array with a number of rows and columns of antenna ports thatthe base station 105 may use to support beamforming of communicationswith a UE 115. Likewise, a UE 115 may have one or more antenna arraysthat may support various MIMO or beamforming operations. Additionally oralternatively, an antenna panel may support radio frequency beamformingfor a signal transmitted via an antenna port.

The base stations 105 or the UEs 115 may use MIMO communications toexploit multipath signal propagation and increase the spectralefficiency by transmitting or receiving multiple signals via differentspatial layers. Such techniques may be referred to as spatialmultiplexing. The multiple signals may, for example, be transmitted bythe transmitting device via different antennas or different combinationsof antennas. Likewise, the multiple signals may be received by thereceiving device via different antennas or different combinations ofantennas. Each of the multiple signals may be referred to as a separatespatial stream and may carry bits associated with the same data stream(for example, the same codeword) or different data streams (for example,different codewords). Different spatial layers may be associated withdifferent antenna ports used for channel measurement and reporting. MIMOtechniques include single-user MIMO (SU-MIMO), where multiple spatiallayers are transmitted to the same receiving device, and multiple-userMIMO (MU-MIMO), where multiple spatial layers are transmitted tomultiple devices.

Beamforming, which may also be referred to as spatial filtering,directional transmission, or directional reception, is a signalprocessing technique that may be used at a transmitting device or areceiving device (for example, a base station 105, a UE 115) to shape orsteer an antenna beam (for example, a transmit beam, a receive beam)along a spatial path between the transmitting device and the receivingdevice. Beamforming may be achieved by combining the signalscommunicated via antenna elements of an antenna array such that somesignals propagating at particular orientations with respect to anantenna array experience constructive interference while othersexperience destructive interference. The adjustment of signalscommunicated via the antenna elements may include a transmitting deviceor a receiving device applying amplitude offsets, phase offsets, or bothto signals carried via the antenna elements associated with the device.The adjustments associated with each of the antenna elements may bedefined by a beamforming weight set associated with a particularorientation (for example, with respect to the antenna array of thetransmitting device or receiving device, or with respect to some otherorientation).

A base station 105 or a UE 115 may use beam sweeping techniques as partof beam forming operations. For example, a base station 105 may usemultiple antennas or antenna arrays (for example, antenna panels) toconduct beamforming operations for directional communications with a UE115. Some signals (for example, synchronization signals, referencesignals, beam selection signals, or other control signals) may betransmitted by a base station 105 multiple times in differentdirections. For example, the base station 105 may transmit a signalaccording to different beamforming weight sets associated with differentdirections of transmission. Transmissions in different beam directionsmay be used to identify (for example, by a transmitting device, such asa base station 105, or by a receiving device, such as a UE 115) a beamdirection for later transmission or reception by the base station 105.

Some signals, such as data signals associated with a particularreceiving device, may be transmitted by a base station 105 in a singlebeam direction (for example, a direction associated with the receivingdevice, such as a UE 115). In some examples, the beam directionassociated with transmissions along a single beam direction may bedetermined based on a signal that was transmitted in one or more beamdirections. For example, a UE 115 may receive one or more of the signalstransmitted by the base station 105 in different directions and mayreport to the base station 105 an indication of the signal that the UE115 received with a highest signal quality or an otherwise acceptablesignal quality.

In some examples, transmissions by a device (for example, by a basestation 105 or a UE 115) may be performed using multiple beamdirections, and the device may use a combination of digital precoding orradio frequency beamforming to generate a combined beam for transmission(for example, from a base station 105 to a UE 115). The UE 115 mayreport feedback that indicates precoding weights for one or more beamdirections, and the feedback may correspond to a configured number ofbeams across a system bandwidth or one or more sub-bands. The basestation 105 may transmit a reference signal (for example, acell-specific reference signal (CRS), a channel state informationreference signal (CSI-RS)), which may be precoded or unprecoded. The UE115 may provide feedback for beam selection, which may be a precodingmatrix indicator (PMI) or codebook-based feedback (for example, amulti-panel type codebook, a linear combination type codebook, a portselection type codebook). Although these techniques are described withreference to signals transmitted in one or more directions by a basestation 105, a UE 115 may employ similar techniques for transmittingsignals multiple times in different directions (for example, foridentifying a beam direction for subsequent transmission or reception bythe UE 115) or for transmitting a signal in a single direction (forexample, for transmitting data to a receiving device).

A receiving device (for example, a UE 115) may try multiple receiveconfigurations (for example, directional listening) when receivingvarious signals from the base station 105, such as synchronizationsignals, reference signals, beam selection signals, or other controlsignals. For example, a receiving device may try multiple receivedirections by receiving via different antenna subarrays, by processingreceived signals according to different antenna subarrays, by receivingaccording to different receive beamforming weight sets (for example,different directional listening weight sets) applied to signals receivedat multiple antenna elements of an antenna array, or by processingreceived signals according to different receive beamforming weight setsapplied to signals received at multiple antenna elements of an antennaarray, any of which may be referred to as “listening” according todifferent receive configurations or receive directions. In someexamples, a receiving device may use a single receive configuration toreceive along a single beam direction (for example, when receiving adata signal). The single receive configuration may be aligned in a beamdirection determined based on listening according to different receiveconfiguration directions (for example, a beam direction determined tohave a highest signal strength, highest signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), orotherwise acceptable signal quality based on listening according tomultiple beam directions).

The wireless communications system 100 may be a packet-based networkthat operates according to a layered protocol stack. In the user plane,communications at the bearer or Packet Data Convergence Protocol (PDCP)layer may be IP-based. A Radio Link Control (RLC) layer may performpacket segmentation and reassembly to communicate over logical channels.A Medium Access Control (MAC) layer may perform priority handling andmultiplexing of logical channels into transport channels. The MAC layermay also use error detection techniques, error correction techniques, orboth to support retransmissions at the MAC layer to improve linkefficiency. In the control plane, the Radio Resource Control (RRC)protocol layer may provide establishment, configuration, and maintenanceof an RRC connection between a UE 115 and a base station 105 or a corenetwork 130 supporting radio bearers for user plane data. At thephysical layer, transport channels may be mapped to physical channels.

The UEs 115 and the base stations 105 may support retransmissions ofdata to increase the likelihood that data is received successfully.Hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) feedback is one technique forincreasing the likelihood that data is received correctly over acommunication link 125. HARQ may include a combination of errordetection (for example, using a cyclic redundancy check (CRC)), forwarderror correction (FEC), and retransmission (for example, automaticrepeat request (ARQ)). HARQ may improve throughput at the MAC layer inpoor radio conditions (for example, low signal-to-noise conditions). Insome examples, a device may support same-slot HARQ feedback, where thedevice may provide HARQ feedback in a specific slot for data received ina previous symbol in the slot. In other cases, the device may provideHARQ feedback in a subsequent slot, or according to some other timeinterval.

Various procedures for beam selection and beam management may increasecommunications quality and reliability in wireless networks that supportnarrow directional beams and high frequencies. Some such beam managementprocedures utilize continuous beam measurements (for example, RSRPmeasurements, SINR measurements, CQI, among other examples) along withadaptive beam switching to maintain a threshold link level betweendevices such as a base station 105 and a UE 115. In some examples, abase station 105 and a UE 115 may implement a multi-step P1-P2-P3 beammanagement procedure for beam selection and refinement. During the P1and P2 procedures, the base station 105 may transmit a number of beams(for example, relatively wide beams) for establishing an initialconnection with the UE 115, and may refine the transmission beam. Duringthe P3 procedure, the UE 115 may perform receive beam refinement byreceiving transmissions of the selected beam from the base station todetermine one or more best receive beams to be used to communicate withthe base station based on the refinement.

In some examples, however, the UE 115 may have a capability toconcurrently or simultaneously receive a transmission from the basestation 105 using each receive beam (or a subset of receive beams),which may reduce the time for conducting beam selection and refinement.Based on the capability to conduct beam refinement on multiple receivebeams concurrently or simultaneously, the UE 115 may be furtherconfigured to skip performing later instances of the P3 beam refinementprocedure. The base station 105 may transmit data, for example in aPDSCH, and based on receiving the data before a time to otherwiseperform a later instance of the P3 beam refinement procedure, the UE 115may perform beam refinement and may skip the later instance of the P3beam refinement procedure.

FIG. 2 illustrates an example of a wireless communications system 200that supports data-aided beam management in accordance with aspects ofthe present disclosure. In some examples, wireless communications system200 may implement aspects of wireless communications system 100. Forexample, the wireless communications system 200 may include a basestation 105-a and a UE 115-a, which may be examples of a base station105 and a UE 115 as described with reference to FIG. 1. The base station105-a may serve a geographic coverage area 110-a. In some examples, thebase station 105-a and the UE 115-a may support various beam managementprocedures to maintain communications within the wireless communicationssystem 200.

Various procedures for beam forming and beam management may supportincreased communications quality and reliability in networks in which alarge number of narrow beams and high frequencies are used (for example,in mmW/NR wireless networks). Some such beam management proceduresutilize a number of beam measurements (for example, RSRP measurements,SINR measurements, among other examples) and beam switching to maintaina threshold link level between a base station and a UE based on beamseparation, beam strength, and other beam quality metrics.

The wireless communications system 200 may implement beam training or anumber of other beam management procedures to refine transmission andreception beams at the base station 105-a and the UE 115-a. In someexamples, the base station 105-a and the UE 115-a may implement amulti-step P1-P2-P3 beam management procedure for beam selection andrefinement. During the P1 procedure, the base station 105-a may transmita number of relatively wide beams (for example, beams 205-a, 205-b) forestablishing an initial connection with the UE 115-a. Such wide beamcoverage from the base station 105-a may support synchronization andincreased mobility of the UE 115-a (for example, the base station 105-amay transmit a number of synchronization signals or synchronizationsignal blocks (SSBs) during the P1 procedure). During the P1 procedure,the UE 115-a may determine the “best” beam (for example, the beamassociated with the highest RSRP, SINR, overall beam quality) of thetransmitted wide beams 205, and may report the beam to the base station105-a. For example, the UE 115-a may determine that the beam 205-a isthe best beam for initial communications establishment with the basestation 105-a.

During the P2 procedure, the base station 105-a may perform transmissionbeam refinement by transmitting concurrent or sequential sweeps of theselected beam (beam 205-a) over a relatively narrow range and usingrelatively narrow beams to refine the selected transmission beam 205-a.The UE 115-a may measure the quality of each beam based on RSRP, orSINR, among other examples, and may report the measurements to the basestation 105-a using a feedback message (for example, in a cri-L1-RSRPmessage, which may include a ranking of one or more beam qualitiesmeasured by the UE 115-a). In some examples, the receiving the UE 115-amay transmit an indication of one or more best refined transmissionbeams to the base station 105-a to identify a selected beam, and in someexamples the base station 105-a may determine one or more besttransmission beams based on the measurements. In some examples, the basestation 105-a may maintain high RSRP for the communications link byswitching active beams to the highest quality beam or the beam with thehighest signal strength.

During the P3 procedure, the UE 115-a may perform receive beamrefinement by receiving transmissions, such as repeated or concurrenttransmissions, of the selected beam 205-a from the base station 105-a.The base station 105-a may transmit the selected beam to the UE 115-a(for example, over a consecutive sequence of symbols), and the UE 115-amay receive the transmission using one or more receive beams 210-a,210-b, or 210-c, or using different panel and beam configurations. Forexample, the UE 115-a may receive signals on a pair of receive beams210, on one receive beam 210, on more than two receive beams, onmultiple beams from different antenna panels, or on multiple receivebeams from the same panels, among other examples. The UE 115-a maymeasure each of the signals received from the selected transmission beam205-a on each of the receive beams 210 and may determine one or morebest receive beams based on the measurements. For example, the UE 115-amay select receive beam 210-a as the best receive beam. The UE 115-a mayuse receive beam 210-a to receive transmissions from the base station105-a. At the completion of the P3 procedure, the transmission andreception beam pairing (between transmission beam 205-a and receive beam210-b) between the UE 115-a and the base station 105-a may provide highRSRP and reliability for communications.

In some examples, however, the UE 115-a may conduct measurements ontransmission or receive beams such that each panel and beam isindividually trained or measured at separate times, which may result inlarge beam-sweeping overhead and signaling latency. For example, UE115-a may conduct measurements on one or more receive beams individuallyover (for example, during) different times, which may increase latencydue to time used for beam refinement.

In some examples of the present disclosure, the UE 115-a may have thecapability to concurrently or simultaneously receive a transmission fromthe base station using each receive beam (or a subset of receive beams)simultaneously, which may reduce the time for conducting beam selectionand refinement. For example, the UE 115-a may receive beam 205-a usingeach of receive beams 210-a, 210-b, and 210-c over (for example, during)a same time duration. In some examples, the UE 115-a may be furtherconfigured with a UE capability that enables the UE 115-a to skip (forexample refrain from performing) later instances of the P3 beamrefinement procedure after an initial multi-step P1-P2-P3 procedureperformed at connection. For example, in cases in which the UE 115-a isconfigured with the UE capability, and in which the UE receives a datatransmission after an initial P3 procedure is performed (for example, aspart of the multi-step P1-P2-P3 procedure) the base station 105-a maytransmit data instead of repeated beams during what would have been a P3procedure, and the UE 115-a may decode the data instead of performingthe P3 beam refinement procedure. The UE 115-a may establishcommunications with a base station 105-a (by performing the P1-P2-P3procedure upon initial connection with the base station 105-a) and theUE 115-a may receive data, for example, in a PDSCH from the base station105-a. Based on receiving the data, and because the UE 115-a mayconcurrently or simultaneously receive the data transmission on multiplereceive beams 210, the UE 115-a may skip a later P3 beam refinementprocedure based on leveraging the operations performed in response toreceiving the data. The UE 115-a may conduct measurements (for example,RSRP, SINR, or CQI) on each of the receive beams 210 concurrently orsimultaneously and may determine the best beam to use for communicatingwith the base station 105-a based on the measurements.

The UE 115-a may transmit an indication of this capability to conductmeasurements on each of the receive beams 210 concurrently orsimultaneously to the base station 105-a (for example, via controlsignaling such as an RRC or a MAC-CE), and the base station 105-a mayskip the later instance of the P3 procedure after transmitting data tothe UE 115-a. In addition, the UE 115-a and base station 105-a maymaintain flexibility to reinstate the later instance of the P3procedure, for example, in cases in which the UE 115-a receives anon-data transmission (for example, no data is transmitted between afirst instance of the P3 procedure and a scheduled time for a secondinstance of the P3 procedure), or in examples in which a durationbetween the data transmission received by the UE 115-a and the laterscheduled P3 procedure is greater than a threshold, or in cases in whichhandover or initial connection establishment again occurs. By performingmeasurements concurrently or simultaneously on multiple receive beams210, the UE 115-a may reduce latency for beam refinement and selection,and may efficiently switch beams more often (as opposed to switchingover instances allocated for the P3 procedure), which may increasecommunications quality and reliability, and may reduce latencyassociated with performing a full beam management procedure.

FIG. 3 illustrates an example of a communications timeline 300 thatsupports data-aided beam management in accordance with aspects of thepresent disclosure. In some examples, communications timeline 300 may beimplemented by or may implement aspects of wireless communicationssystem 100. For example, the communications timeline 300 may be relatedto actions performed by a base station 105-b and a UE 115-b, which maybe examples of a base station 105 and a UE 115 as described withreference to FIGS. 1-2.

In some wireless systems, devices such as a UE 115-a and a base station105-b may conduct beam management processes in accordance with aperiodicity to maintain link quality and reliability during ongoingcommunications. In some examples of the present disclosure, the beammanagement may be relatively continuous (for example, the UE 115-b mayperform beam refinement whenever receiving data from the base stationsuch as between a periodicity for performing instances of a beamrefinement procedure like the P3 procedure).

At slot 0, the UE 115-b and base station may identify a first event320-a that may prompt the UE 115-b and base station 105-b to perform aninitial connection establishment procedure which may include amulti-step P1-P2-P3 beam management procedure 315 for establishing acommunication beam pair. For example, the base station may select anumber of beams over concurrent symbols including transmit beam 305-aduring a P1-P2 procedure and the UE 115-b may select the receive beam310-a, for example, based on measurements conducted during a P3procedure.

The UE 115-b may transmit a capability indication relatively early on(for example, using RRC signaling) to the base station 105-b afterinitial connection. In some examples, the capability indication maynotify the base station that the UE 115-b is capable of receivingtransmissions concurrently or simultaneously using multiple receivebeams (and performing measurements concurrently or simultaneously on thereceive beams). Such a UE capability may be employed in wirelessnetworks supporting sub-THz frequency ranges (for example, 140 GHz),which may provide for concurrent or simultaneous beam operation andshort wavelength may support a large number of devices in a small area.In some examples, the UE capability may (implicitly or explicitly)notify the base station 105-b of a capability of the UE 115-b to refrainfrom performing a second instance of the P3 procedure (for example, anext instance of the P3 procedure) in a subsequent slot (for example,the UE 115-b may refrain from performing the P3 procedure 345 in slot10) in cases in which the UE 115-b receives one or more datatransmissions after the first P3 procedure (for example, in slot 0) andbefore the scheduled next P3 procedure (for example, in slot 10).

In some examples, after initial connection with the base station at320-a, the UE 115-b may receive a data transmission from the basestation 105-b at 325 in a downlink transmission. The UE 115-b maycontinuously conduct beam refinement of beams 310 for the transmission(for example, on the PDSCH or a demodulation reference signal (DMRS) ofthe downlink transmission). The UE 115-b may receive the PDSCH or theDMRS using multiple UE receive beams 310, and may measure one or morebeam quality metrics such as RSRP, SINR, capacity, CQI, among otherexamples for at least some if not each received beam, and may determinethe best receive beam for the UE 115-b to use based on the measurements.For example, the base station 105-b may transmit a data transmission305-c during slot 4, and the UE may determine receive beam 310-c as thebest receive beam to be used based on the measurements made at eachreceive beam. In such an example, this reflects a change in receive beamfrom receive beam 310-a determined by the initial P3 procedure in slot 0compared to receive beam 310-c determined based on the data transmission305-c in slot 4.

In some examples, the UE 115-b may support receive beam measurements formultiple beams transmitted from the base station 105-b or from otherbase stations in the network. For example, the UE 115-b may receivemultiple beams from multiple directions, and the UE 115-b may usemultiple receive beams to determine a best quality receive beam for atleast some if not each beam (for example, multiple transmission beamsfrom multiple base stations may be measured concurrently orsimultaneously).

Based on receiving the transmission of data from the base station 105-b,the UE 115-a may determine a capability to skip a next P3 procedure (forexample, the P3 procedure 345 in slot 10). For example, the UE 115-a maydetermine skip the next P3 procedure based on the capability of the UE115-a to concurrently or simultaneously perform measurements on multiplereceive beams, or additionally or alternatively based on a capability ofthe UE 115-a to perform beam mitigation and measurements at differentslots. For example, if the UE 115-a receives a data transmission fromthe base station 105-b, the P3 procedure in slot 10 may be redundant toany potential determination or adjustment made between slot 0 and slot10 because of the UE capability and receiving the data from the basestation 105-b.

In some examples, the base station 105-b may transmit a message (forexample, via RRC signaling) that notifies the UE 115-b that if the UEreceives data, the UE 115-b may not perform an instance of a subsequentP3 procedure (for example, in slot 10). The base station 105-b maydetermine a UE capability for the UE 115-b to do so (for example, viaRRC signaling), and based on the UE capability, the base station 105-bmay suspend a later instance of the P3 procedure if data is transmitted.The base station 105-b or the UE 115-b or both may instead rely on theUE capability (for example, for continuous beam measurements includingDMRS-based beam refinement procedures). The UE 115-b may transmit anindication of this capability to the base station 105-b so that the basestation 105-b may determine to refrain from conducting the instance ofthe subsequent P3 procedure.

Because the UE 115-b may measure receive beams concurrently orsimultaneously (for example, by conducting measurements of each DMRS ofa PDSCH rather than according to a periodicity), the UE 115-b maydetermine system changes or beam quality deterioration due to, forexample, UE movement (for example, at 335, a rotation of the UE 115-b ora change in location of the UE 115-b may cause reduced signal strengthfor a previously selected best beam such as beam 310-c). At 340, the UE115-b may switch receive beams to beam 310-d according to the concurrentor simultaneous beam measurement. In such examples, communication beamsmay be switched based on the duration of an OFDM symbol. For example,upon conducting beam measurements at slot 7, the UE 115-b may determinethat beam 310-c is no longer the best receive beam based on one or morebeam measurements, and may determine a different higher quality beam(for example, beam 310-d) to switch to for communicating with the basestation 105-b. In some examples, the UE 115-b may change beams duringthe start of the next slot (slot 8), during the end of the current slot(slot 7), or otherwise upon determining that the beam quality forselected beam 310-c has degraded or that beam 310-d has relativelybetter characteristics. In some examples, the beam switching may occurduring a duration associated with a cyclic prefix of an OFDM symbol.

In some examples, the UE 115-b and base station 105-b may determine toreinstate the second instance of the P3 procedure, for example, in casesin which the UE 115-a receives a non-data transmission, or in cases inwhich a duration between the data transmission (for example, at slot 4)and the later-scheduled second instance of the P3 procedure is greaterthan a threshold, or in cases in which handover or a further initialconnection establishment occurs. At slot 9 or at slot 10, for example,the UE 115-b and base station may identify a second event 320-b that mayprompt the UE 115-b and base station 105-b to perform the secondinstance of the P3 beam refinement procedure 345. The base station 105-bmay transmit a number of beams over concurrent symbols includingtransmit beam 305-b and the UE 115-b may select the receive beam 310-b,for example, based on measurements conducted during a P3 procedure. Insome examples, the P3 procedure 345 may be a second instance of the P3procedure performed at 315. The P3 procedure 345 may be skipped in casesin which the UE 115-a receives data from the base station 105-b inbetween the first P3 procedure (for example, at slot 0) and the secondindicated P3 procedure (for example, at slot 10).

FIG. 4 illustrates an example of a process flow 400 that supportsdata-aided beam management in accordance with aspects of the presentdisclosure. In some examples, process flow 400 may be implemented by ormay implement aspects of wireless communications system 100 or 200. Theprocess flow 400 includes UE 115-c and base station 105-c (each of whichmay be examples of the corresponding devices described with reference toFIGS. 1-3). Alternative examples of the following may be implemented, inwhich some steps are performed in a different order than described orare not performed at all. In some examples, steps may include additionalfeatures not mentioned below, or further steps may be added. Inaddition, while process flow 400 shows processes between base station105-c and a single UE 115-c, it should be understood that theseprocesses may occur between any number of network devices.

At 405, the UE 115-c may transmit, to the base station 105-c afterestablishing a communications link, an indication of a capability of theUE 115-c to perform a first beam refinement procedure in response to adata transmission. In some examples, the first beam refinement proceduremay employ measurements of one or more receive beams at the UE 115-c.The UE 115-c may transmit the capability indication to the base station105-c using control signaling such as an RRC message, a MAC-CE, or both.In some examples, the capability indication may indicate a capability ofthe UE 115-c to receive the data transmission concurrently orsimultaneously using the one or more receive beams. Additionally oralternatively, the capability indication may indicate a capability ofthe UE 115-c to skip or refrain from performing one or more instances ofa second beam refinement procedure.

At 410, the UE 115-c may perform a connection procedure with the basestation 105-c to select a receive beam. For example, the UE 115-c mayperform a first instance of a second beam refinement procedure (forexample, a P3 procedure) to select a first receive beam from one or morereceive beams. The base station 105-c may transmit a same transmit beamover consecutive symbols to the UE 115-c as part of the first instanceof the second beam refinement procedure and the UE 115-c may select areceive beam from a plurality of receive beams to use in receiving fromthe base station 105-c. Alternatively to 405, the UE 115-c may transmit,to the base station 105-c after performing the connection procedure withthe base station 105-c to select a receive beam at 410, an indication ofa capability of the UE 115-c to perform a first beam refinementprocedure in response to a data transmission

At 415, the UE 115-c may receive a data transmission from the basestation 105-c using the first receive beam after selecting the firstreceive beam at 410 and before a second instance of the second beamrefinement procedure. In some examples, the UE 115-c may determine tosuspend the second instance of the second beam refinement procedurebased on receiving the data transmission. The UE 115-c may receive thedata transmission on a PDCCH and may measure one or more beam refinementparameters on a DMRS of the PDCCH. In some examples, the UE 115-c may becapable of transmitting one or more data transmissions during a durationotherwise associated with the second instance of the second beamrefinement procedure based on the UE capability (for example, instead ofperforming the second instance of the second beam refinement procedure,which may be a P3 procedure, the UE 115-c may transmit data to the basestation 105-c). Such additional data transmission may increasethroughput and communications efficiency in the wireless system.Additionally or alternatively, in some examples, the base station 105-cmay be capable of transmitting or receiving one or more datatransmissions during a duration otherwise associated with the secondinstance of the second beam refinement procedure based on the UEcapability (for example, instead of performing the second instance ofthe second beam refinement procedure, which may be a P3 procedure, thebase station 105-c may transmit data to the UE 115-c or may communicatein some way with one or more other devices such as one or more other UEs115 or base stations 105 or both).

In some examples, the UE 115-c may determine a duration for which tosuspend the second beam refinement procedure based at least in part on adoppler spread measurement, a RRC message, or both. The UE 115-c maytransmit, to the base station, an indication of the duration for whichto suspend the second beam refinement procedure via control signalingsuch as RRC signaling.

In some examples, the UE 115-c may receive one or more non-datatransmissions from the base station 105-a after receiving the datatransmission. The UE 115-c may determine to perform the second beamrefinement procedure based on receiving the one or more non-datatransmissions (for example, at the second instance of the second beamrefinement procedure).

At 420, the UE 115-c may perform the first beam refinement procedure inresponse to the data transmission and based on receiving the datatransmission from the base station 105-c. In some examples, the firstbeam refinement procedure may include measuring one or more beamrefinement parameters for each beam of a number of receive beams at theUE 115-c, and selecting a second receive beam of the number of receivebeams based on performing the beam refinement parameter measurements.Such beam refinement parameters may include RSRP measurements, SINRmeasurements, CQI, a system capacity, or any combination thereof.

In some examples, the UE 115-c may measure the one or more beamrefinement parameters for each receive beam during an OFDM symbolperiod. The UE 115-c may compare a first value of the one or more beamrefinement parameters associated with the first receive beam to a secondvalue of the one or more beam refinement parameters associated with asecond receive beam. Based on comparing the first and second receivebeams, the UE 115-c may select the second receive beam or the firstreceive beam. In some examples, the UE 115-c may switch from the firstreceive beam to the second receive beam during the OFDM symbol period orduring an adjacent OFDM symbol period.

In some examples, the UE 115-c may receive a second data transmissionusing a third receive beam and may perform the first beam refinementprocedure for the first and the third receive beams concurrently. Thesecond data transmission may be transmitted from the base station 105-c,or from a different base station or UE present in the wireless system.

FIG. 5 shows a block diagram of a device 505 that supports data-aidedbeam management in accordance with aspects of the present disclosure.The device 505 may be an example of aspects of a UE 115 as describedherein. The device 505 may include a receiver 510, a communicationsmanager 515, and a transmitter 520. The communications manager 515 canbe implemented, at least in part, by one or both of a modem and aprocessor. Each of these components may be in communication with oneanother (for example, via one or more buses).

The receiver 510 may receive information such as packets, user data, orcontrol information associated with various information channels (forexample, control channels, data channels, and information related todata-aided beam management, among other examples). Information may bepassed on to other components of the device 505. The receiver 510 may bean example of aspects of the transceiver 820 described with reference toFIG. 8. The receiver 510 may utilize a single antenna or a set ofantennas.

The communications manager 515 may transmit, to a base station, anindication of a capability of the UE to perform a first beam refinementprocedure in response to a data transmission and using a set of receivebeams, select a first receive beam from the set of receive beams basedon performing a first instance of a second beam refinement procedureusing the set of receive beams, receive the data transmission from thebase station using the set of receive beams including the first receivebeam before a second instance of the second beam refinement procedure,and perform the first beam refinement procedure based on receiving thedata transmission.

The transmitter 520 may transmit signals generated by other componentsof the device 505. In some examples, the transmitter 520 may becollocated with a receiver 510 in a transceiver component. For example,the transmitter 520 may be an example of aspects of the transceiver 820described with reference to FIG. 8. The transmitter 520 may utilize asingle antenna or a set of antennas.

In some examples, communications manager 515 may be implemented as anintegrated circuit or chipset for a mobile device modem, and thereceiver 510 and transmitter 520 may be implemented as analog components(for example, amplifiers, filters, and antennas) coupled with the mobiledevice modem to enable wireless transmission and reception.

The communications manager 515 as described herein may be implemented torealize one or more potential advantages. At least one implementationmay enable communications manager 515 to effectively identify a datatransmission and skip (refrain from performing) a subsequent beamrefinement procedure. In some other implementations, the communicationsmanager 515 may identify a capability to perform simultaneous beammeasurements on multiple receive beams at the device 505.

Based on implementing the techniques as described herein, one or moreprocessors of the device 505 (for example, processor(s) controlling orincorporated with one or more of receiver 510, communications manager515, and transmitter 520) may effectively reduce signaling overheadassociated with beam training and beam management. In some otherexamples, the techniques described herein may allow for reduced latencyfor performing beam management procedures, and may increasecommunications reliability and quality, while increasing throughput.

FIG. 6 shows a block diagram of a device 605 that supports data-aidedbeam management in accordance with aspects of the present disclosure.The device 605 may be an example of aspects of a device 505, or a UE 115as described herein. The device 605 may include a receiver 610, acommunications manager 615, and a transmitter 640. The communicationsmanager 615 can be implemented, at least in part, by one or both of amodem and a processor. Each of these components may be in communicationwith one another (for example, via one or more buses).

The receiver 610 may receive information such as packets, user data, orcontrol information associated with various information channels (forexample, control channels, data channels, and information related todata-aided beam management, among other examples). Information may bepassed on to other components of the device 605. The receiver 610 may bean example of aspects of the transceiver 820 described with reference toFIG. 8. The receiver 610 may utilize a single antenna or a set ofantennas.

The communications manager 615 may include a capability indicationtransmitter 620, a receive beam selection component 625, a data receivercomponent 630, and a first beam refinement procedure component 635.

The capability indication transmitter 620 may transmit, to a basestation, an indication of a capability of the UE to perform a first beamrefinement procedure in response to a data transmission and using a setof receive beams.

The receive beam selection component 625 may select a first receive beamfrom the set of receive beams based on performing a first instance of asecond beam refinement procedure using the set of receive beams.

The data receiver component 630 may receive the data transmission fromthe base station using the set of receive beams including the firstreceive beam before a second instance of the second beam refinementprocedure.

The first beam refinement procedure component 635 may perform the firstbeam refinement procedure based on receiving the data transmission.

The transmitter 640 may transmit signals generated by other componentsof the device 605. In some examples, the transmitter 640 may becollocated with a receiver 610 in a transceiver component. For example,the transmitter 640 may be an example of aspects of the transceiver 820described with reference to FIG. 8. The transmitter 640 may utilize asingle antenna or a set of antennas.

FIG. 7 shows a block diagram of a communications manager 705 thatsupports data-aided beam management in accordance with aspects of thepresent disclosure. The communications manager 705 may be an example ofaspects of a communications manager 515, a communications manager 615,or a communications manager 810 described herein. The communicationsmanager 705 may include a capability indication transmitter 710, areceive beam selection component 715, a data receiver component 720, afirst beam refinement procedure component 725, a second beam refinementprocedure component 730, a receive beam measurement component 735, areceive beam switch component 740, a data transmission component 745,and a non-data transmission component 750. Each of these components maycommunicate, directly or indirectly, with one another (for example, viaone or more buses).

The capability indication transmitter 710 may transmit, to a basestation, an indication of a capability of the UE to perform a first beamrefinement procedure in response to a data transmission and using a setof receive beams. In some examples, the capability indicationtransmitter 710 may transmit the capability to perform the first beamrefinement procedure via a radio resource control message, a mediumaccess control-control element, or both. In some examples, thecapability indication transmitter 710 may transmit an indication of acapability of the UE to receive the data transmission simultaneouslyusing the set of receive beams.

The receive beam selection component 715 may select a first receive beamfrom the set of receive beams based on performing a first instance of asecond beam refinement procedure using the set of receive beams. In someexamples, the receive beam selection component 715 may select a secondreceive beam of the set of receive beams based on measuring the one ormore beam refinement parameters.

The first beam refinement procedure component 725 may perform the firstbeam refinement procedure based on receiving the data transmission. Thedata receiver component 720 may receive the data transmission from thebase station using the set of receive beams including the first receivebeam before a second instance of the second beam refinement procedure.

In some examples, the first beam refinement procedure component 725 mayreceive the data transmission on a physical downlink control channel,where measuring the one or more beam refinement parameters includesmeasuring the one or more beam refinement parameters on a downlinkmodulation reference signal of the physical downlink control channel.

In some examples, the data receiver component 720 may receive a seconddata transmission using a third receive beam. In some examples, thefirst beam refinement procedure component 725 may concurrently performthe first beam refinement procedure for the first and the third receivebeams based on receiving the data transmission and the second datatransmission.

The second beam refinement procedure component 730 may suspendperforming the second instance of the second beam refinement procedurebased on receiving the data transmission. In some examples, the secondbeam refinement procedure component 730 may transmit, to the basestation, an indication of the duration for which to suspend the secondbeam refinement procedure. In some examples, the second beam refinementprocedure component 730 may determine a duration for which to suspendthe second beam refinement procedure based on a doppler spreadmeasurement, a radio resource control message, or both.

In some examples, the second beam refinement procedure component 730 mayperform the second beam refinement procedure based on the receiving ofthe one or more non-data transmissions and a duration after performingthe first beam refinement procedure. The non-data transmission component750 may receive one or more non-data transmissions from the base stationafter receiving the data transmission. In some examples, the second beamrefinement procedure includes a P3 procedure.

The receive beam measurement component 735 may measure one or more beamrefinement parameters for each beam of the set of receive beams. In someexamples, the receive beam measurement component 735 may measure the oneor more beam refinement parameters on a downlink modulation referencesignal of the physical downlink control channel.

In some examples, the receive beam measurement component 735 may measurethe one or more beam refinement parameters for each beam of the set ofreceive beams during an orthogonal frequency division multiplexingsymbol period. In some examples, the receive beam measurement component735 may compare a first value of the one or more beam refinementparameters associated with the first receive beam to a second value ofthe one or more beam refinement parameters associated with a secondreceive beam. In some examples, the one or more beam refinementparameters include a reference signal receive power, a signal tointerference and noise ratio, a channel quality indication, a systemcapacity, or any combination thereof.

In some examples, the receive beam measurement component 735 may selectthe second receive beam or the first receive beam based on thecomparing. The receive beam switch component 740 may switch, during theorthogonal frequency division multiplexing symbol period or during anadjacent orthogonal frequency division multiplexing symbol period, fromthe first receive beam to the second receive beam based on comparing thefirst value to the second value.

The data transmission component 745 may transmit, to the base station,one or more data transmissions during a duration associated with thesecond instance of the second beam refinement procedure based on theindication of the capability of the UE to perform the first beamrefinement procedure.

FIG. 8 shows a diagram of a system including a device 805 that supportsdata-aided beam management in accordance with aspects of the presentdisclosure. The device 805 may be an example of or include thecomponents of device 505, device 605, or a UE 115 as described herein.The device 805 may include components for bi-directional voice and datacommunications including components for transmitting and receivingcommunications, including a communications manager 810, an I/Ocontroller 815, a transceiver 820, an antenna 825, memory 830, and aprocessor 840. These components may be in electronic communication viaone or more buses (for example, bus 845).

The communications manager 810 may transmit, to a base station, anindication of a capability of the UE to perform a first beam refinementprocedure in response to a data transmission and using a set of receivebeams, select a first receive beam from the set of receive beams basedon performing a first instance of a second beam refinement procedureusing the set of receive beams, receive the data transmission from thebase station using the set of receive beams including the first receivebeam before a second instance of the second beam refinement procedure,and perform the first beam refinement procedure based on receiving thedata transmission.

The I/O controller 815 may manage input and output signals for thedevice 805. The I/O controller 815 may also manage peripherals notintegrated into the device 805. In some examples, the I/O controller 815may represent a physical connection or port to an external peripheral.In some examples, the I/O controller 815 may utilize an operating systemsuch as iOS®, ANDROID®, MS-DOS®, MS-WINDOWS®, OS/2®, UNIX®, LINUX®, oranother known operating system. In other cases, the I/O controller 815may represent or interact with a modem, a keyboard, a mouse, atouchscreen, or a similar device. In some examples, the I/O controller815 may be implemented as part of a processor. In some examples, a usermay interact with the device 805 via the I/O controller 815 or viahardware components controlled by the I/O controller 815.

The transceiver 820 may communicate bi-directionally, via one or moreantennas, wired, or wireless links as described above. For example, thetransceiver 820 may represent a wireless transceiver and may communicatebi-directionally with another wireless transceiver. The transceiver 820may also include a modem to modulate the packets and provide themodulated packets to the antennas for transmission, and to demodulatepackets received from the antennas.

In some examples, the wireless device may include a single antenna 825.However, in some examples the device may have more than one antenna 825,which may be capable of concurrently transmitting or receiving multiplewireless transmissions.

The memory 830 may include RAM and ROM. The memory 830 may storecomputer-readable, computer-executable code 835 including instructionsthat, when executed, cause the processor to perform various functionsdescribed herein. In some examples, the memory 830 may contain, amongother things, a basic input/output system (BIOS) which may control basichardware or software operation such as the interaction with peripheralcomponents or devices.

The processor 840 may include an intelligent hardware device, (forexample, a general-purpose processor, a DSP, a CPU, a microcontroller,an ASIC, a field programmable gate array (FPGA), a programmable logicdevice, a discrete gate or transistor logic component, a discretehardware component, or any combination thereof). In some examples, theprocessor 840 may be configured to operate a memory array using a memorycontroller. In other cases, a memory controller may be integrated intothe processor 840. The processor 840 may be configured to executecomputer-readable instructions stored in a memory (for example, thememory 830) to cause the device 805 to perform various functions (forexample, functions or tasks supporting data-aided beam management).

The code 835 may include instructions to implement aspects of thepresent disclosure, including instructions to support wirelesscommunications. The code 835 may be stored in a non-transitorycomputer-readable medium such as system memory or other type of memory.In some examples, the code 835 may not be directly executable by theprocessor 840 but may cause a computer (for example, when compiled andexecuted) to perform functions described herein.

FIG. 9 shows a block diagram of a device 905 that supports data-aidedbeam management in accordance with aspects of the present disclosure.The device 905 may be an example of aspects of a base station 105 asdescribed herein. The device 905 may include a receiver 910, acommunications manager 915, and a transmitter 920. The communicationsmanager 915 can be implemented, at least in part, by one or both of amodem and a processor. Each of these components may be in communicationwith one another (for example, via one or more buses).

The receiver 910 may receive information such as packets, user data, orcontrol information associated with various information channels (forexample, control channels, data channels, and information related todata-aided beam management, among other examples). Information may bepassed on to other components of the device 905. The receiver 910 may bean example of aspects of the transceiver 1220 described with referenceto FIG. 12. The receiver 910 may utilize a single antenna or a set ofantennas.

The communications manager 915 may receive, from a UE, an indication ofa capability of the UE to perform a first beam refinement procedure inresponse to a data transmission and using a set of receive beams,transmit a same transmit beam over consecutive symbols to the UE as partof a first instance of a second beam refinement procedure, and transmitthe data transmission to the UE before a second instance of the secondbeam refinement procedure based on receiving the indication of thecapability of the UE and transmitting the same transmit beam overconsecutive symbols to the UE.

The transmitter 920 may transmit signals generated by other componentsof the device 905. In some examples, the transmitter 920 may becollocated with a receiver 910 in a transceiver component. For example,the transmitter 920 may be an example of aspects of the transceiver 1220described with reference to FIG. 12. The transmitter 920 may utilize asingle antenna or a set of antennas.

FIG. 10 shows a block diagram of a device 1005 that supports data-aidedbeam management in accordance with aspects of the present disclosure.The device 1005 may be an example of aspects of a device 905, or a basestation 105 as described herein. The device 1005 may include a receiver1010, a communications manager 1015, and a transmitter 1035. Thecommunications manager 1015 can be implemented, at least in part, by oneor both of a modem and a processor. Each of these components may be incommunication with one another (for example, via one or more buses).

The receiver 1010 may receive information such as packets, user data, orcontrol information associated with various information channels (forexample, control channels, data channels, and information related todata-aided beam management, among other examples). Information may bepassed on to other components of the device 1005. The receiver 1010 maybe an example of aspects of the transceiver 1220 described withreference to FIG. 12. The receiver 1010 may utilize a single antenna ora set of antennas. The communications manager 1015 may include acapability indication receiver 1020, a second beam refinement procedurecomponent 1025, and a data transmitter 1030.

The capability indication receiver 1020 may receive, from a UE, anindication of a capability of the UE to perform a first beam refinementprocedure in response to a data transmission and using a set of receivebeams.

The second beam refinement procedure component 1025 may transmit a sametransmit beam over consecutive symbols to the UE as part of a firstinstance of a second beam refinement procedure.

The data transmitter 1030 may transmit the data transmission to the UEbefore a second instance of the second beam refinement procedure basedon receiving the indication of the capability of the UE and transmittingthe same transmit beam over consecutive symbols to the UE.

The transmitter 1035 may transmit signals generated by other componentsof the device 1005. In some examples, the transmitter 1035 may becollocated with a receiver 1010 in a transceiver component. For example,the transmitter 1035 may be an example of aspects of the transceiver1220 described with reference to FIG. 12. The transmitter 1035 mayutilize a single antenna or a set of antennas.

In some examples, communications manager 1015 may be implemented as anintegrated circuit or chipset for a mobile device modem, and thereceiver 1010 and transmitter 1035 may be implemented as analogcomponents (for example, amplifiers, filters, and antennas) coupled withthe mobile device modem to enable wireless transmission and reception.

The communications manager 1015 as described herein may be implementedto realize one or more potential advantages. At least one implementationmay enable communications manager 1015 to effectively identify a UEcapability to skip (refrain from performing) a next beam refinementprocedure based on receiving a data transmission. In some otherimplementations, the communications manager 1015 may identify a UEcapability to perform simultaneous beam measurements on multiple receivebeams, thus eliminating repeated transmissions for receiver beamtraining.

Based on implementing the techniques as described herein, one or moreprocessors of the device 1005 (for example, processor(s) controlling orincorporated with one or more of receiver 1010, communications manager1015, and transmitter 1035) may effectively reduce signaling overheadassociated with beam training and beam management. In some otherexamples, the techniques described herein may allow for reduced latencyfor performing beam management procedures, and may increasecommunications reliability and quality, while increasing throughput.

FIG. 11 shows a block diagram of a communications manager 1105 thatsupports data-aided beam management in accordance with aspects of thepresent disclosure. The communications manager 1105 may be an example ofaspects of a communications manager 915, a communications manager 1015,or a communications manager 1210 described herein. The communicationsmanager 1105 may include a capability indication receiver 1110, a secondbeam refinement procedure component 1115, a data transmitter 1120, adata transmission component 1125, a data receiver component 1130, and anon-data transmission component 1135. Each of these components maycommunicate, directly or indirectly, with one another (for example, viaone or more buses).

The capability indication receiver 1110 may receive, from a UE, anindication of a capability of the UE to perform a first beam refinementprocedure in response to a data transmission and using a set of receivebeams. In some examples, the capability indication receiver 1110 mayreceive an indication of a capability of the UE to receive the datatransmission simultaneously using the set of receive beams, wheretransmitting the data transmission is based on receiving the indicationof the capability of the UE to receive the data transmissionsimultaneously using the set of receive beams.

The data transmitter 1120 may transmit the data transmission to the UEbefore a second instance of the second beam refinement procedure basedon receiving the indication of the capability of the UE and transmittingthe same transmit beam over consecutive symbols to the UE.

The second beam refinement procedure component 1115 may transmit a sametransmit beam over consecutive symbols to the UE as part of a firstinstance of a second beam refinement procedure. In some examples, thesecond beam refinement procedure component 1115 may suspend performingthe second instance of the second beam refinement procedure based ontransmitting the data transmission.

In some examples, the second beam refinement procedure component 1115may receive, from the UE, an indication of a duration for which tosuspend the second beam refinement procedure, the duration being basedon a doppler spread measurement, a radio resource control message, orboth. In some examples, the second beam refinement procedure includes aP3 procedure.

The data transmission component 1125 may transmit the data transmissionon a physical downlink control channel, the method further including:communicating with the UE based on transmitting the data transmission onthe physical downlink control channel. In some examples, the datatransmission component 1125 may receive the indication of the capabilityof the UE to perform the first beam refinement procedure via a radioresource control message, a medium access control-control element, orboth.

The data receiver component 1130 may receive one or more datatransmissions during a duration associated with the second instance ofthe second beam refinement procedure based on receiving the capabilityof the UE to perform the first beam refinement procedure.

The non-data transmission component 1135 may transmit one or morenon-data transmissions to the UE after transmitting the datatransmission after the UE performs the first beam refinement procedureand before the second instance of the second beam refinement procedure.

FIG. 12 shows a diagram of a system including a device 1205 thatsupports data-aided beam management in accordance with aspects of thepresent disclosure. The device 1205 may be an example of or include thecomponents of device 905, device 1005, or a base station 105 asdescribed herein. The device 1205 may include components forbi-directional voice and data communications including components fortransmitting and receiving communications, including a communicationsmanager 1210, a network communications manager 1215, a transceiver 1220,an antenna 1225, memory 1230, a processor 1240, and an inter-stationcommunications manager 1245. These components may be in electroniccommunication via one or more buses (for example, bus 1250).

The communications manager 1210 may receive, from a UE, an indication ofa capability of the UE to perform a first beam refinement procedure inresponse to a data transmission and using a set of receive beams,transmit a same transmit beam over consecutive symbols to the UE as partof a first instance of a second beam refinement procedure, and transmitthe data transmission to the UE before a second instance of the secondbeam refinement procedure based on receiving the indication of thecapability of the UE and transmitting the same transmit beam overconsecutive symbols to the UE.

The network communications manager 1215 may manage communications withthe core network (for example, via one or more wired backhaul links).For example, the network communications manager 1215 may manage thetransfer of data communications for client devices, such as one or moreUEs 115.

The transceiver 1220 may communicate bi-directionally, via one or moreantennas, wired, or wireless links as described above. For example, thetransceiver 1220 may represent a wireless transceiver and maycommunicate bi-directionally with another wireless transceiver. Thetransceiver 1220 may also include a modem to modulate the packets andprovide the modulated packets to the antennas for transmission, and todemodulate packets received from the antennas.

In some examples, the wireless device may include a single antenna 1225.However, in some examples the device may have more than one antenna1225, which may be capable of concurrently transmitting or receivingmultiple wireless transmissions.

The memory 1230 may include RAM, ROM, or a combination thereof. Thememory 1230 may store computer-readable code 1235 including instructionsthat, when executed by a processor (for example, the processor 1240)cause the device to perform various functions described herein. In someexamples, the memory 1230 may contain, among other things, a BIOS whichmay control basic hardware or software operation such as the interactionwith peripheral components or devices.

The processor 1240 may include an intelligent hardware device, (forexample, a general-purpose processor, a DSP, a CPU, a microcontroller,an ASIC, an FPGA, a programmable logic device, a discrete gate ortransistor logic component, a discrete hardware component, or anycombination thereof). In some examples, the processor 1240 may beconfigured to operate a memory array using a memory controller. In someexamples, a memory controller may be integrated into processor 1240. Theprocessor 1240 may be configured to execute computer-readableinstructions stored in a memory (for example, the memory 1230) to causethe device 1205 to perform various functions (for example, functions ortasks supporting data-aided beam management).

The inter-station communications manager 1245 may manage communicationswith other base station 105, and may include a controller or schedulerfor controlling communications with UEs 115 in cooperation with otherbase stations 105. For example, the inter-station communications manager1245 may coordinate scheduling for transmissions to UEs 115 for variousinterference mitigation techniques such as beamforming or jointtransmission. In some examples, the inter-station communications manager1245 may provide an X2 interface within an LTE/LTE-A wirelesscommunication network technology to provide communication between basestations 105.

The code 1235 may include instructions to implement aspects of thepresent disclosure, including instructions to support wirelesscommunications. The code 1235 may be stored in a non-transitorycomputer-readable medium such as system memory or other type of memory.In some examples, the code 1235 may not be directly executable by theprocessor 1240 but may cause a computer (for example, when compiled andexecuted) to perform functions described herein.

FIG. 13 shows a flowchart illustrating a method that supports data-aidedbeam management in accordance with aspects of the present disclosure.The operations of method 1300 may be implemented by a UE 115 or itscomponents as described herein. For example, the operations of method1300 may be performed by a communications manager as described withreference to FIGS. 5-8. In some examples, a UE may execute a set ofinstructions to control the functional elements of the UE to perform thefunctions described below. Additionally or alternatively, a UE mayperform aspects of the functions described below using special-purposehardware.

At 1305, the UE may transmit, to a base station, an indication of acapability of the UE to perform a first beam refinement procedure inresponse to a data transmission and using a set of receive beams. Theoperations of 1305 may be performed according to the methods describedherein. In some examples, aspects of the operations of 1305 may beperformed by a capability indication transmitter as described withreference to FIGS. 5-8.

At 1310, the UE may select a first receive beam from the set of receivebeams based on performing a first instance of a second beam refinementprocedure using the set of receive beams. The operations of 1310 may beperformed according to the methods described herein. In some examples,aspects of the operations of 1310 may be performed by a receive beamselection component as described with reference to FIGS. 5-8.

At 1315, the UE may receive the data transmission from the base stationusing the set of receive beams including the first receive beam before asecond instance of the second beam refinement procedure. The operationsof 1315 may be performed according to the methods described herein. Insome examples, aspects of the operations of 1315 may be performed by adata receiver component as described with reference to FIGS. 5-8.

At 1320, the UE may perform the first beam refinement procedure inresponse to the data transmission based on receiving the datatransmission. The operations of 1320 may be performed according to themethods described herein. In some examples, aspects of the operations of1320 may be performed by a first beam refinement procedure component asdescribed with reference to FIGS. 5-8.

FIG. 14 shows a flowchart illustrating a method that supports data-aidedbeam management in accordance with aspects of the present disclosure.The operations of method 1400 may be implemented by a UE 115 or itscomponents as described herein. For example, the operations of method1400 may be performed by a communications manager as described withreference to FIGS. 5-8. In some examples, a UE may execute a set ofinstructions to control the functional elements of the UE to perform thefunctions described below. Additionally or alternatively, a UE mayperform aspects of the functions described below using special-purposehardware.

At 1405, the UE may transmit, to a base station, an indication of acapability of the UE to perform a first beam refinement procedure inresponse to a data transmission and using a set of receive beams. Theoperations of 1405 may be performed according to the methods describedherein. In some examples, aspects of the operations of 1405 may beperformed by a capability indication transmitter as described withreference to FIGS. 5-8.

At 1410, the UE may select a first receive beam from the set of receivebeams based on performing a first instance of a second beam refinementprocedure using the set of receive beams. The operations of 1410 may beperformed according to the methods described herein. In some examples,aspects of the operations of 1410 may be performed by a receive beamselection component as described with reference to FIGS. 5-8.

At 1415, the UE may receive the data transmission from the base stationusing the set of receive beams including the first receive beam before asecond instance of the second beam refinement procedure. The operationsof 1415 may be performed according to the methods described herein. Insome examples, aspects of the operations of 1415 may be performed by adata receiver component as described with reference to FIGS. 5-8.

At 1420, the UE may suspend performing the second instance of the secondbeam refinement procedure based on receiving the data transmission. Theoperations of 1420 may be performed according to the methods describedherein. In some examples, aspects of the operations of 1420 may beperformed by a second beam refinement procedure component as describedwith reference to FIGS. 5-8.

At 1425, the UE may perform the first beam refinement procedure inresponse to the data transmission based on receiving the datatransmission. The operations of 1425 may be performed according to themethods described herein. In some examples, aspects of the operations of1425 may be performed by a first beam refinement procedure component asdescribed with reference to FIGS. 5-8.

FIG. 15 shows a flowchart illustrating a method that supports data-aidedbeam management in accordance with aspects of the present disclosure.The operations of method 1500 may be implemented by a UE 115 or itscomponents as described herein. For example, the operations of method1500 may be performed by a communications manager as described withreference to FIGS. 5-8. In some examples, a UE may execute a set ofinstructions to control the functional elements of the UE to perform thefunctions described below. Additionally or alternatively, a UE mayperform aspects of the functions described below using special-purposehardware.

At 1505, the UE may transmit, to a base station, an indication of acapability of the UE to perform a first beam refinement procedure inresponse to a data transmission and using a set of receive beams. Theoperations of 1505 may be performed according to the methods describedherein. In some examples, aspects of the operations of 1505 may beperformed by a capability indication transmitter as described withreference to FIGS. 5-8.

At 1510, the UE may select a first receive beam from the set of receivebeams based on performing a first instance of a second beam refinementprocedure using the set of receive beams. The operations of 1510 may beperformed according to the methods described herein. In some examples,aspects of the operations of 1510 may be performed by a receive beamselection component as described with reference to FIGS. 5-8.

At 1515, the UE may receive the data transmission from the base stationusing the set of receive beams including the first receive beam before asecond instance of the second beam refinement procedure. The operationsof 1515 may be performed according to the methods described herein. Insome examples, aspects of the operations of 1515 may be performed by adata receiver component as described with reference to FIGS. 5-8.

At 1520, the UE may perform the first beam refinement procedure based onreceiving the data transmission. The operations of 1520 may be performedaccording to the methods described herein. In some examples, aspects ofthe operations of 1520 may be performed by a first beam refinementprocedure component as described with reference to FIGS. 5-8.

At 1525, the UE may measure one or more beam refinement parameters foreach beam of the set of receive beams. The operations of 1525 may beperformed according to the methods described herein. In some examples,aspects of the operations of 1525 may be performed by a receive beammeasurement component as described with reference to FIGS. 5-8.

At 1530, the UE may select a second receive beam of the set of receivebeams based on measuring the one or more beam refinement parameters. Theoperations of 1530 may be performed according to the methods describedherein. In some examples, aspects of the operations of 1530 may beperformed by a receive beam selection component as described withreference to FIGS. 5-8.

FIG. 16 shows a flowchart illustrating a method that supports data-aidedbeam management in accordance with aspects of the present disclosure.The operations of method 1600 may be implemented by a UE 115 or itscomponents as described herein. For example, the operations of method1600 may be performed by a communications manager as described withreference to FIGS. 5-8. In some examples, a UE may execute a set ofinstructions to control the functional elements of the UE to perform thefunctions described below. Additionally or alternatively, a UE mayperform aspects of the functions described below using special-purposehardware.

At 1605, the UE may transmit, to a base station, an indication of acapability of the UE to perform a first beam refinement procedure inresponse to a data transmission and using a set of receive beams. Theoperations of 1605 may be performed according to the methods describedherein. In some examples, aspects of the operations of 1605 may beperformed by a capability indication transmitter as described withreference to FIGS. 5-8.

At 1610, the UE may select a first receive beam from the set of receivebeams based on performing a first instance of a second beam refinementprocedure using the set of receive beams. The operations of 1610 may beperformed according to the methods described herein. In some examples,aspects of the operations of 1610 may be performed by a receive beamselection component as described with reference to FIGS. 5-8.

At 1615, the UE may receive the data transmission from the base stationusing the set of receive beams including the first receive beam before asecond instance of the second beam refinement procedure. The operationsof 1615 may be performed according to the methods described herein. Insome examples, aspects of the operations of 1615 may be performed by adata receiver component as described with reference to FIGS. 5-8.

At 1620, the UE may determine a duration for which to suspend the secondbeam refinement procedure based on a doppler spread measurement, a radioresource control message, or both. The operations of 1620 may beperformed according to the methods described herein. In some examples,aspects of the operations of 1620 may be performed by a second beamrefinement procedure component as described with reference to FIGS. 5-8.

At 1625, the UE may transmit, to the base station, an indication of theduration for which to suspend the second beam refinement procedure. Theoperations of 1625 may be performed according to the methods describedherein. In some examples, aspects of the operations of 1625 may beperformed by a second beam refinement procedure component as describedwith reference to FIGS. 5-8.

At 1630, the UE may perform the first beam refinement procedure inresponse to the data transmission based on receiving the datatransmission. The operations of 1630 may be performed according to themethods described herein. In some examples, aspects of the operations of1630 may be performed by a first beam refinement procedure component asdescribed with reference to FIGS. 5-8.

FIG. 17 shows a flowchart illustrating a method 1700 that supportsdata-aided beam management in accordance with aspects of the presentdisclosure. The operations of method 1700 may be implemented by a basestation 105 or its components as described herein. For example, theoperations of method 1700 may be performed by a communications manageras described with reference to FIGS. 9-12. In some examples, a basestation may execute a set of instructions to control the functionalelements of the base station to perform the functions described below.Additionally or alternatively, a base station may perform aspects of thefunctions described below using special-purpose hardware.

At 1705, the base station may receive, from a UE, an indication of acapability of the UE to perform a first beam refinement procedure inresponse to a data transmission and using a set of receive beams. Theoperations of 1705 may be performed according to the methods describedherein. In some examples, aspects of the operations of 1705 may beperformed by a capability indication receiver as described withreference to FIGS. 9-12.

At 1710, the base station may transmit a same transmit beam overconsecutive symbols to the UE as part of a first instance of a secondbeam refinement procedure. The operations of 1710 may be performedaccording to the methods described herein. In some examples, aspects ofthe operations of 1710 may be performed by a second beam refinementprocedure component as described with reference to FIGS. 9-12.

At 1715, the base station may transmit the data transmission to the UEbefore a second instance of the second beam refinement procedure basedon receiving the indication of the capability of the UE and transmittingthe same transmit beam over consecutive symbols to the UE. Theoperations of 1715 may be performed according to the methods describedherein. In some examples, aspects of the operations of 1715 may beperformed by a data transmitter as described with reference to FIGS.9-12.

It should be noted that the methods described herein describe possibleimplementations, and that the operations and the steps may be rearrangedor otherwise modified and that other implementations are possible.Further, aspects from two or more of the methods may be combined.

Although aspects of an LTE, LTE-A, LTE-A Pro, or NR system may bedescribed for purposes of example, and LTE, LTE-A, LTE-A Pro, or NRterminology may be used in much of the description, the techniquesdescribed herein are applicable beyond LTE, LTE-A, LTE-A Pro, or NRnetworks. For example, the described techniques may be applicable tovarious other wireless communications systems such as Ultra MobileBroadband (UMB), Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers(IEEE) 802.11 (Wi-Fi), IEEE 802.16 (WiMAX), IEEE 802.20, Flash-OFDM, aswell as other systems and radio technologies not explicitly mentionedherein.

Information and signals described herein may be represented using any ofa variety of different technologies and techniques. For example, data,instructions, commands, information, signals, bits, symbols, and chipsthat may be referenced throughout the description may be represented byvoltages, currents, electromagnetic waves, magnetic fields or particles,optical fields or particles, or any combination thereof.

The various illustrative blocks and components described in connectionwith the disclosure herein may be implemented or performed with ageneral-purpose processor, a DSP, an ASIC, a CPU, an FPGA or otherprogrammable logic device, discrete gate or transistor logic, discretehardware components, or any combination thereof designed to perform thefunctions described herein. A general-purpose processor may be amicroprocessor, but in the alternative, the processor may be anyprocessor, controller, microcontroller, or state machine. A processormay also be implemented as a combination of computing devices (forexample, a combination of a digital signal processor (DSP) and amicroprocessor, multiple microprocessors, one or more microprocessors inconjunction with a DSP core, or any other such configuration).

The functions described herein may be implemented in hardware, softwareexecuted by a processor, firmware, or any combination thereof. Ifimplemented in software executed by a processor, the functions may bestored on or transmitted over as one or more instructions or code on acomputer-readable medium. Other examples and implementations are withinthe scope of the disclosure and appended claims. For example, due to thenature of software, functions described herein may be implemented usingsoftware executed by a processor, hardware, firmware, hardwiring, orcombinations of any of these. Features implementing functions may alsobe physically located at various positions, including being distributedsuch that portions of functions are implemented at different physicallocations.

Computer-readable media includes both non-transitory computer storagemedia and communication media including any medium that facilitatestransfer of a computer program from one place to another. Anon-transitory storage medium may be any available medium that may beaccessed by a general-purpose or special-purpose computer. By way ofexample, and not limitation, non-transitory computer-readable media mayinclude random-access memory (RAM), read-only memory (ROM), electricallyerasable programmable ROM (EEPROM), flash memory, compact disk (CD) ROMor other optical disk storage, magnetic disk storage or other magneticstorage devices, or any other non-transitory medium that may be used tocarry or store desired program code means in the form of instructions ordata structures and that may be accessed by a general-purpose orspecial-purpose computer, or a general-purpose or special-purposeprocessor. Also, any connection is properly termed a computer-readablemedium. For example, if the software is transmitted from a website,server, or other remote source using a coaxial cable, fiber optic cable,twisted pair, digital subscriber line (DSL), or wireless technologiessuch as infrared, radio, and microwave, then the coaxial cable, fiberoptic cable, twisted pair, DSL, or wireless technologies such asinfrared, radio, and microwave are included in the definition ofcomputer-readable medium. Disk and disc, as used herein, include CD,laser disc, optical disc, digital versatile disc (DVD), floppy disk andBlu-ray disc where disks usually reproduce data magnetically, whilediscs reproduce data optically with lasers. Combinations of the aboveare also included within the scope of computer-readable media.

As used herein, including in the claims, “or” as used in a list of items(for example, a list of items prefaced by a phrase such as “at least oneof” or “one or more of”) indicates an inclusive list such that, forexample, a list of at least one of A, B, or C means A or B or C or AB orAC or BC or ABC (in other words, A and B and C). Also, as used herein,the phrase “based on” shall not be construed as a reference to a closedset of conditions. For example, an example step that is described as“based on condition A” may be based on both a condition A and acondition B without departing from the scope of the present disclosure.In other words, as used herein, the phrase “based on” shall be construedin the same manner as the phrase “based at least in part on.”

In the appended figures, similar components or features may have thesame reference label. Further, various components of the same type maybe distinguished by following the reference label by a dash and a secondlabel that distinguishes among the similar components. If just the firstreference label is used in the specification, the description isapplicable to any one of the similar components having the same firstreference label irrespective of the second reference label, or othersubsequent reference label.

The description set forth herein, in connection with the appendeddrawings, describes example configurations and does not represent allthe examples that may be implemented or that are within the scope of theclaims. The term “example” used herein means “serving as an example,instance, or illustration,” and not “preferred” or “advantageous overother examples.” The detailed description includes specific details forthe purpose of providing an understanding of the described techniques.These techniques, however, may be practiced without these specificdetails. In some instances, known structures and devices are shown inblock diagram form in order to avoid obscuring the concepts of thedescribed examples.

The description herein is provided to enable a person having ordinaryskill in the art to make or use the disclosure. Various modifications tothe disclosure will be apparent to a person having ordinary skill in theart, and the generic principles defined herein may be applied to othervariations without departing from the scope of the disclosure. Thus, thedisclosure is not limited to the examples and designs described herein,but is to be accorded the broadest scope consistent with the principlesand novel features disclosed herein.

What is claimed is:
 1. A method for wireless communications at a userequipment (UE), comprising: transmitting, to a base station, anindication of a capability of the UE to perform a first beam refinementprocedure in response to a data transmission and using a plurality ofreceive beams; selecting a first receive beam from the plurality ofreceive beams based at least in part on performing a first instance of asecond beam refinement procedure using the plurality of receive beams;receiving the data transmission from the base station using theplurality of receive beams comprising the first receive beam before asecond instance of the second beam refinement procedure; and performingthe first beam refinement procedure based at least in part on receivingthe data transmission.
 2. The method of claim 1, further comprisingsuspending performing the second instance of the second beam refinementprocedure based at least in part on receiving the data transmission. 3.The method of claim 2, further comprising: determining a duration forwhich to suspend the second beam refinement procedure based at least inpart on a doppler spread measurement, a radio resource control message,or both; and transmitting, to the base station, an indication of theduration for which to suspend the second beam refinement procedure. 4.The method of claim 1, wherein performing the first beam refinementprocedure comprises: measuring one or more beam refinement parametersfor each beam of the plurality of receive beams; and selecting a secondreceive beam of the plurality of receive beams based at least in part onmeasuring the one or more beam refinement parameters.
 5. The method ofclaim 1, wherein receiving the data transmission from the base stationcomprises: receiving the data transmission on a physical downlinkcontrol channel, and wherein measuring the one or more beam refinementparameters comprises; and measuring the one or more beam refinementparameters on a downlink modulation reference signal of the physicaldownlink control channel.
 6. The method of claim 1, wherein performingthe first beam refinement procedure comprises: measuring the one or morebeam refinement parameters for each beam of the plurality of receivebeams during an orthogonal frequency division multiplexing symbolperiod; comparing a first value of the one or more beam refinementparameters associated with the first receive beam to a second value ofthe one or more beam refinement parameters associated with a secondreceive beam; and selecting the second receive beam or the first receivebeam based at least in part on the comparing.
 7. The method of claim 6,further comprising switching, during the orthogonal frequency divisionmultiplexing symbol period or during an adjacent orthogonal frequencydivision multiplexing symbol period, from the first receive beam to thesecond receive beam based at least in part on comparing the first valueto the second value.
 8. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or morebeam refinement parameters comprise a reference signal receive power, asignal to interference and noise ratio, a channel quality indication, asystem capacity, or any combination thereof.
 9. The method of claim 1,wherein transmitting the indication of the capability of the UE toperform the first beam refinement procedure comprises transmitting thecapability to perform the first beam refinement procedure via a radioresource control message, a medium access control-control element, orboth.
 10. The method of claim 1, further comprising: receiving a seconddata transmission using a third receive beam; and concurrentlyperforming the first beam refinement procedure for the first and thethird receive beams based at least in part on receiving the datatransmission and the second data transmission.
 11. The method of claim1, further comprising transmitting, to the base station, one or moredata transmissions during a duration associated with the second instanceof the second beam refinement procedure based at least in part on theindication of the capability of the UE to perform the first beamrefinement procedure.
 12. The method of claim 1, further comprising:receiving one or more non-data transmissions from the base station afterreceiving the data transmission; and performing the second beamrefinement procedure based at least in part on the receiving of the oneor more non-data transmissions and a duration after performing the firstbeam refinement procedure.
 13. The method of claim 1, whereintransmitting the indication of the capability of the UE to perform thefirst beam refinement procedure comprises transmitting an indication ofa capability of the UE to receive the data transmission simultaneouslyusing the plurality of receive beams.
 14. The method of claim 1, whereinthe second beam refinement procedure comprises a P3 procedure.
 15. Amethod for wireless communications at a base station, comprising:receiving, from a user equipment (UE), an indication of a capability ofthe UE to perform a first beam refinement procedure in response to adata transmission and using a plurality of receive beams; transmitting asame transmit beam over consecutive symbols to the UE as part of a firstinstance of a second beam refinement procedure; and transmitting thedata transmission to the UE before a second instance of the second beamrefinement procedure based at least in part on receiving the indicationof the capability of the UE and transmitting the same transmit beam overconsecutive symbols to the UE.
 16. The method of claim 15, furthercomprising suspending performing the second instance of the second beamrefinement procedure based at least in part on transmitting the datatransmission.
 17. The method of claim 16, further comprising receiving,from the UE, an indication of a duration for which to suspend the secondbeam refinement procedure, the duration being based at least in part ona doppler spread measurement, a radio resource control message, or both.18. The method of claim 15, wherein transmitting the data transmissionto the UE comprises: transmitting the data transmission on a physicaldownlink control channel, the method further comprising: communicatingwith the UE based at least in part on transmitting the data transmissionon the physical downlink control channel.
 19. The method of claim 15,wherein receiving the indication of the capability of the UE comprisesreceiving the indication of the capability of the UE to perform thefirst beam refinement procedure via a radio resource control message, amedium access control-control element, or both.
 20. The method of claim15, further comprising receiving one or more data transmissions during aduration associated with the second instance of the second beamrefinement procedure based at least in part on receiving the capabilityof the UE to perform the first beam refinement procedure.
 21. The methodof claim 15, further comprising transmitting one or more non-datatransmissions to the UE after transmitting the data transmission afterthe UE performs the first beam refinement procedure and before thesecond instance of the second beam refinement procedure.
 22. The methodof claim 15, wherein receiving the indication of the capability of theUE to perform the first beam refinement procedure comprises receiving anindication of a capability of the UE to receive the data transmissionsimultaneously using the plurality of receive beams, whereintransmitting the data transmission is based at least in part onreceiving the indication of the capability of the UE to receive the datatransmission simultaneously using the plurality of receive beams. 23.The method of claim 15, wherein the second beam refinement procedurecomprises a P3 procedure.
 24. An apparatus for wireless communicationsat a user equipment (UE), comprising: a processor, memory coupled withthe processor; and instructions stored in the memory and executable bythe processor to cause the apparatus to: transmit, to a base station, anindication of a capability of the UE to perform a first beam refinementprocedure in response to a data transmission and using a plurality ofreceive beams; select a first receive beam from the plurality of receivebeams based at least in part on performing a first instance of a secondbeam refinement procedure using the plurality of receive beams; receivethe data transmission from the base station using the plurality ofreceive beams comprising the first receive beam before a second instanceof the second beam refinement procedure; and perform the first beamrefinement procedure based at least in part on receiving the datatransmission.
 25. The apparatus of claim 24, wherein the instructionsare further executable by the processor to cause the apparatus tosuspend performing the second instance of the second beam refinementprocedure based at least in part on receiving the data transmission. 26.The apparatus of claim 24, wherein the instructions to perform the firstbeam refinement procedure are executable by the processor to cause theapparatus to: measure one or more beam refinement parameters for eachbeam of the plurality of receive beams; and select a second receive beamof the plurality of receive beams based at least in part on measuringthe one or more beam refinement parameters.
 27. The apparatus of claim24, wherein the instructions to receive the data transmission from thebase station are executable by the processor to cause the apparatus to:receive the data transmission on a physical downlink control channel,and wherein measuring the one or more beam refinement parameterscomprises; and measure the one or more beam refinement parameters on adownlink modulation reference signal of the physical downlink controlchannel.
 28. The apparatus of claim 24, wherein the instructions toperform the first beam refinement procedure are executable by theprocessor to cause the apparatus to: measure the one or more beamrefinement parameters for each beam of the plurality of receive beamsduring an orthogonal frequency division multiplexing symbol period;compare a first value of the one or more beam refinement parametersassociated with the first receive beam to a second value of the one ormore beam refinement parameters associated with a second receive beam;and select the second receive beam or the first receive beam based atleast in part on the comparing.
 29. The apparatus of claim 24, whereinthe instructions to transmit the indication of the capability of the UEto perform the first beam refinement procedure are executable by theprocessor to cause the apparatus to transmit the capability to performthe first beam refinement procedure via a radio resource controlmessage, a medium access control-control element, or both.
 30. Anapparatus for wireless communications at a base station, comprising: aprocessor, memory coupled with the processor; and instructions stored inthe memory and executable by the processor to cause the apparatus to:receive, from a user equipment (UE), an indication of a capability ofthe UE to perform a first beam refinement procedure in response to adata transmission and using a plurality of receive beams; transmit asame transmit beam over consecutive symbols to the UE as part of a firstinstance of a second beam refinement procedure; and transmit the datatransmission to the UE before a second instance of the second beamrefinement procedure based at least in part on receiving the indicationof the capability of the UE and transmitting the same transmit beam overconsecutive symbols to the UE.